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YANKEE FANTASIES 



OTHER WORKS 
BY PERCY MACKAYE 



The Canterbury Pilgrims. A Comedy. 

Jeanne d'Arc. A Tragedy. 

Sappho and Phaon. A Tragedy. 

Fenris, the Wolf. A Tragedy. 

A Garland to Sylvia. A Dramatic Re- 
verie. 

The Scarecrow. A Tragedy of the 
Ludicrous. 

Mater. An American Study in Comedy. 

Anti-Matrimony. A Satirical Comedy. 

To-morrow. A Play in Three Acts. 

Poems. 

Lincoln: A Centenary Ode. 

The Playhouse and the Play. Essays. 



YANKEE FANTASIES 



Five One-Act Plays 



BY 
PERCY MACKAYE 




New York 

DUFFIELD & COMPANY 

1912 



/ 



Copyright, 19 12. 
By PERCY MACKAYE. 



All of the plays in this volume have been copyrighted and published 
simultaneously in the United States and Great Britain. 

All acting rights, both professional and amateur, are reserved, in 
the United States, Great Britain and all countries of the Copyright 
Union, by Percy MacKaye. Performances forbidden and right of 
representation reserved. Piracy or infringement will be prosecuted in 
accordance with penalties provided by the United States Statutes: Sec. 
4966, U. S. Revised Statutes, Title 60, Chap. 3. 

Permission to perform any of the plays in this volume must 
be obtained from the author. 

Persons desiring to read professionally in public any of 
these plays should first apply to the author. 

All rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign 
languages, including the Scandinavian. 



.//■ 



->^' 



©CU305682 

wo. i 



J. E. F. 

THESE FANTASIES 

ARE DEDICATED 

IN FRIENDSHIP 



CONTENTS 

Page 
Preface ix 

CHUCK : An Orchard Fantasy I 

GETTYSBURG: A Woodshed Commentary 35 

THE ANTICK: A Wayside Sketch 55 

THE CAT-BOAT: A Fantasy for Music 107 

SAM AVERAGE: A Silhouette 137 



PREFACE 

In country New England, where the writer has 
lived a large part of his winters and summers, human 
life is endowed with a poetry and drama distinctive, and 
not often realized by the casual observer, revealing 
its true nature only to those who love it with knowl- 
edge. From its half outwintered Puritanism — like 
arbutus from March-thaw banks— bloom strange hu- 
man surprises; some lovely as flowers fragrant of 
their native haunts; others exotic, pagan, humorous, 
grotesque with contrasts, which fascinate and pique 
the dramatic artist to interpret them adequately. 

For under all the outward dunness of Yankee life, 
there burns dimly a kind of smothered rebellion 
against its own chill constraint: a rebellion which 
blazes up in color, rather than fire, in a variety of 
human species, of which such a nature as Margaret 
Fuller's, in "Transcendental" days, is suggestively an 
example. 

The native race, moreover, is dying, or being trans- 
muted, and this touches the imagination of the drama- 
tist to interpret it before its inevitable passing. 

These little plays hardly unveil the borderland of 
the wistful poetry of that passing; but at least they 
may suggest, through fantasy, the quaintness and 
surprisingness of truth, in characters such as Chuck, 
Julie Bonheur, Jonas Boutwell, Link Tadbourne. 

ix 



,x PREFACE 

Thus the woodchuck traits of native character are 
famihar to the selectmen of every small Yankee com- 
munity in their dealings with the poachings and va- 
grancies of the local church-and-town-scoffing rap- 
scallion, who personally is often the most charming 
boon companion of the countryside. 

The innate contempt of the Yankee for the "Canuck" 
(his French invader from Canada), increased by 
contrast of temperament and the steady encroachings 
of the Canuck industrially upon the more agricultural 
race; the survival, in modified form to-day, of Old 
England's "Anticks" and buffoon Masquers in the 
holiday appearances of the so-called "Antiques and 
Horribles": these are characteristic rather of Massa- 
chusetts communities than of other parts of New 
England. 

In the interpretation, moreover, of all Yankee* na- 
ture, the truth is not to be ignored that the race of 
New England has always been a race of readers, so 
that the tradition of books has become for them a vital 
part of real life, entering even into the thoughts and 

*In the interpretation of rural Yankee characters, the use of their 
distinctive dialect is, of course, needful. It is not really possible, 
however, to record any dialect artistically in the symbols of spelling. The 
implied shades of sound are subtle, and must be known to the reader 
beforehand to be justly reproduced bj^ him in sound from the written 
page. The trained actor can, of course, render them rightly to the 
ears of his audience only if he be familiar with the spoken dialect. 
The spellings thar and ye, for example — dialect forms for there and 
you — are no adequate record of those words as spoken by a pers^on 
who uses the dialect unconsciously. Such a person uses elisions and 
shadings of sound impossible to record, even by resorting to grotesque 
methods. 

Yer, or yuh, for instance, is no clearer a symbol than ye for sug- 
gesting the sound of that word as spoken variously in dialect. More- 
over, country New Englanders use the dialect in all stages _ of its 
gradual disintegration, from those who use still a pure "Bigelow" 
vocabulary and pronounciation, to those whose dictionary English is 
tinged by the mere dying twang of Yankeedom. 

To the eye, therefore, the written dialect forms must miss something 
of their epokea naturalness; but this is unavoidable. 



PREFACE xi 

motives of the illiterate. Thus the actual "life-study" 
suggestion for Jonas Boutwell, in ''The Antick," was 
a dear old cow-driving, congregational minister, from 
whom I received — sonorously intoned — my earliest ex- 
cerpts from the Elizabethan dramatists ; and a carpen- 
ter found reading The Odyssey — as in 'The Cat-Boat" 
— is not yet a prodigy among the children of Massa- 
chusetts schoolmasters. 

In a recent volume on "The Repertory Theatre," 
Mr. P. P. Howe has convincingly shown how the 
present crying "need of the theatre is freedom to ex- 
periment," and how the promise of that freedom lies 
in "the Repertory Spirit." 

Among the few distinguished achievements of rep- 
ertory in English thus far, the productions of the Irish 
Players are eminent. Significantly, those productions 
have been, in large measure, one-act plays ; and sig- 
nificantly one-act plays have elsewhere been practically 
absent from the regular English-speaking stage. Thus, 
but for the founding of the Abbey Theatre at Dublin, 
many charming and characteristic works of poets like 
Yeats and Singe might never have been written. On 
the other hand, among the "long run" dramatists, Mr. 
J. M. Barrie appears to be the one exceptional author 
of produced one-act plays. 

Yet the one-act play is not only a form of expres- 
sion fascinating in its manifold possibilities of dra- 
matic suggestion ; it is also a distinctive form, capable 
of expressing what the longer play can not. Like the 
short story, it is a special form of literature, but un- 
like the short story, the one-act play has not yet found 
its special publisher: that is, its theatrical producer. 



xii PREFACE 

With the exception of the Abbey Theatre, there is as 
yet no professional theatre which produces one-act 
plays in English as a creative, artistic policy. 

In America, this lack is the more to be deplored be- 
cause it is so unnecessary. That the needful creators 
of literature exist in America is demonstrated, for in- 
stance, — aside from our drama — by the high quality of 
work produced by a large number of short-story wri- 
ters, and a lesser number of poets. That likewise there 
exists the public demand of all classes for a form of 
drama less sustained in action and time than the 
three-, four-, or five-act play, is demonstrated on the 
one hand by the nation-wide desire of amateurs in col- 
leges, schools and elsewhere, to perform and witness 
one-act plays, and on the other hand, by the desire of 
millions to witness the one-act "sketches" of Vaude- 
ville. That the needful money also exists is not to be 
disputed. 

The one needful thing still lacking, then, is the in- 
telligent initiative, of individuals or communities, to 
establish financially the practical means which shall 
enable those already existing creators of literature to 
serve that already existing demand for the one-act 
form of expression, in a way to deepen and refine that 
demand through enriching the power, charm and va- 
riety of the one-act form itself. 

For one thing, creative experiment in that form is 
more practical than in longer forms. Ten one-act 
plays might be written by a dramatist in the time re- 
quired for the same writer to create one long play. 
Ten one-act plays might often be performed for the 
expense of one long one. But still more important, 



PREFACE xiii 

such creative experiment would make possible not 
simply the enrichment of the one-act form itself, but — 
by means of that — the enrichment of all ampler dra- 
matic forms, which are fed and upbuilt by the subtle 
fusings and crystallizings of the lesser forms. 

For this the needful and practical instrument would 
be what I may appropriately term a Studio Theatre — 
a theatre dedicated in policy wholly to experiment in 
dramatic art, being for the dramatist what his studio 
is for the painter, or his laboratory for the physicist. 

Without such a specific working shop, fully equip- 
ped with the tools and interpreters of his art, and in- 
dependent of immediate sales for his work, the scope 
and growth of the dramatist's art must remain limited 
by the conditions of speculative demand. 

When, however, intelligent initiative shall have es- 
tablished such Studio Theatres, the American drama- 
tist will be free to sketch and execute many quiet, 
quaint and lovely interpretations of our native envir- 
onment now ignored. Particularly the aspects of rural 
life and character may then be etched lovingly with 
dramatic light and shade, and the dramatist may di- 
vine truthfully, and interpret freshly, from country- 
life numberless varieties and conflicts of human char- 
acter, untrammelled by the need for Comic Supple- 
ment appeal, or "Old Homestead" conventions. 

May lovers of the theatre soon see this need for its 
art, and supply it! 

The present small volume seeks merely to suggest it. 

In their themes, these five short plays treat of only 
a limited part of the potential native field — the Yan- 
kee, which takes its national importance from the 



xiv PREFACE 

deep-seated historical influence of New England, and 
New England character, upon all our national life and 
growth. 

Yankee interpretations, in the spirit of fantasy, have 
before now been conceived and welcomed in other 
forms of literature: the novel, the poem, the short 
story. Perhaps they may have their value, as pioneer 
experiment at least, in the form of drama. 

Quite apart, however, from the limited field of these 
fantasies, unlimited aspects of our American life, 
rural and civic, local and national, are available to the 
dramatist who shall invoke for his work the Experi- 
mental Spirit, as otherwise they are not available. 

It would be pleasant if these little plays might help 
to incite others in America to invoke that Spirit for the 
one-act form to larger and subtler results than their 
author has consummated. If so, they will have served, 
to that good purpose, the most important cause in the 
art of our theatre to-day — creative experiment. 

Percy MacKaye. 

Cornish, New Hampshire, 
October, 191 1. 



CHUCK 

An Orchard Fantasy 



CHARACTERS 



DEACON DOLE. 
ABEL, his elder son, 
ELIJAH, his younger son, 
LETTY, a young girl. 



The scene is laid in an old township of northern New Eng- 
land, at the present time: An Orchard Hillside, on an 
afternoon in late August. 



CHUCK* 

The foreground is shadowed by apple-tree boughs, beneath 

which a footpath winds betzveen piles of ripe, sweet apples, 
climbs the slope toward the background, and disappears 
[left] behind bushes of alder and witch-hasel, the latter 
in golden bloom. Beloiv tfiese bushes, and partly screened 
by others in the left foreground, the edge of an eddying 
pool is visible, flecked with sunbeams and leaf-shadows 
and blotched zvith the luminous red of cardinal flowers. 

The pool is evidently the shallow curve of a brook, for the 
plash of a waterfall tinkles behind the bushes, and occa- 
sional spray glistens through the greenery. Near the 
further bank of the pool is a low, flat bowlder, behind 
which a less trodden path leads from the main footway 
into the hazel cover. 

In the centre middleground rises a grassy knoll, the top of 
which is scarred yellow by the gravel of a woodchuck's 
burrow, partly excavated, it would seem, by a spade, 
which stands, thrust upright now, in the debris nearby. 
Fringing the knoll are loiv bushes of huckleberry, lamb- 
kill and sweet fern; behind it, the orchard slopes down 
steeply toward the right; beyond it, through the apple 
trees, are glimpses of rolling, summer hills. 

When the scene opens, an oriole is singing somewhere in the 
leafy sunshine. 

•Copyright, 19 12, by Percy MacKaye. All rights reserved. 

I 



2 CHUCK 

On the ruined doorsill of his burrow, a woodchuck, squat on 
comfortable haunches, sits nibbling an ear of corn. 

Deaf to the one and blind to the other, enters — left, along the 
footpath— Deaco-^ Dole: a spare, black figure in Sab- 
bath-day garb. His shrewd, shaven face, home-cut, gre^ 
hair and stiff-kneed gait are those of a Yankee farmer 
about seventy. He walks slozvly, clutching a black book in 
one hand, twice pausing to look back along the path. 

From away on the left, a deep-toned bell resounds with 
regular cadence. 

With the bell tones, intermittently from beyond the bushes, 
are mingled the shrilly notes of a tin flute, piped merrily. 

On a sudden, conscious of the flute, the Deacon stops and lis- 
tens; stoops and peers among the bushes; then ga^es 
reflectively at the woodchuck's hole, whose occupant, at 
his approach, has retired within, all but his furry noddle. 
As the old man turns aside cui'iously to examine this, a 
lozv, giggling laughter is distinctly audible. The Deacdn's 
face darkens. Again the flute notes trill, in the intervals 
of the bell 

THE DEACON 
{Stands stiffly erect, and calls in a loud, harsh voice.} 
Chuck ! — Chuck ! 

A VOICE 
[Deep like the Deacon's, but faint, as if far away.] 
Chuck ! — Chuck ! 



CHUCK 3 

[With troubled look, Deacon Dole turns again to the footpath 
and is resuming kis measured walk, when the sharp report 
of a gun causes him to exclaim and start back. The wood- 
chuck's head vanishes.] 

THE DEACON 

[Screwing his face.] 
Damn him! 

[Then hugging tighter his book, he mutters.] 
Lord, on Thy day — into temptation ! 

A VOICE 
[From behind the bushes, musical and vibrant with laughter.] 
Chucky! Chucky! Whoa, thar! 

[Through the hazels behind the bowlder, Abel enters and 
bounds, zvith a hop, skip and jump, to the top of the knoll. 
There he stands reloading his gun, and clucking his cheek 
like a chipmunk.] 

So, old Bunker! Scot into your breastworks, did 
ye? Godfrey, you Ve got book larnin' for field sar- 
vice! 

[Abel is a young fellow, about twenty: a half -wild figure, 
clothed in tattered yellow undershirt and blue overalls, 
frayed half to the knees — his bare arms and legs sun- 
browned and splotched with wood-stains. 

His expression just now is sly and twinkling, as his small 
squirrel eyes squint through his tozvsled tow hair. On his 
head are laid great green lily-pads, tied by long, rubbery 
stems under his chin. From his belt hang the pelts of 
small animals, greyish brown. From one hip-pocket sticks 
a tin flute, from the other a cartridge box.] 



4 



CHUCK 



THE DEACON 

[Glozvering.'] 
Mornin', Chuck! 

[Abel drops his gun and starts up, scared by the voice.] 
Dressed for meetin', I see, and keepin' the Sabbath 
's usual. 

[Pointing to the lily-pads on Abel's head.] 
What ye call it — bonnet, or hat? 

ABEL 
[With the gleam of a grin.] 
Them 's cure for sunstroke! 

THE DEACON 
Oh! — What have ye — hired out to a new trade, 
sence ye broke jail? 

ABEL 
[His look growing subtle and sullen.] 
What trade? 

THE DEACON 
[With the ghost of a thin smile.] 
Murder. 

ABEL 
What ye goin' to run me in for now ? 

THE DEACON 
Killin* your kin, be ye? 

ABEL 

[Amazed, then amused.] 
Now, thar! So ye thought I took that shot — 

THE DEACON 
Oh, not at me. I ain't no kin o' yourn now, nor you 
ain't none o' mine. 



~ CHUCK 5 

[Points to the biuTozv.] 
I was makin' reference to them thievin' field-rat 
folks o' yourn, the lusty varmin that farrowed ye, and 
swapped ye off, m my first-born's cradle, for a son o' 
mine ; them thar, that namesaked ye, your huckleberry 
brethren — the woodchucks. 

[Smiling, acidly.] 
Thou shalt not commit Murder, saith the command- 
ment! 

ABEL 

[Who has listened with growing good humor, shows the skins 

at his belt and laughs.] 

If ye mean old Bunker in thar — look a-here! I 've 
skun the hull family, 'ceptin' the old man. 

THE DEACON 
[Keenly.] 
So ye have ; so ye have. 

ABEL 
I tried to dig him out with the spade; but while I 
was bangin' down his front door, he put on his sneak- 
ers and slipped out the back ell. 

[Laughs reminiscently.] 
I tell ye: he ain't forgot his calc'latin' tables — the old 
un! 

THE DEACON 
[Ruminating, with relish.] 
So he ain't; so he ain't! 

ABEL 
I pretty nigh cotched him last week, though. I 
hadn't no gun, so he jest sat thar and winked. Then 



6 CHUCK 

I fetched a grab — but Jehu! he can bite, when ye try 
to pull his leg. 

THE DEACON 
So he can ! And speakin' o' calc'latin', how many 
times, do you calc'late, I 've told you to clear out? 

[Abel grins.'\ 
Eh ? Answer me : how many ? 

ABEL 

[Taking out his flute. ^ 

So I answered him, as I thought good: 
"As many red herrin's as grow in the wood.'' 
[He plays a snatch on the flute, hopping to his tune.] 

THE DEACON 
[Shaking his book at him.] 

Quit it ! Quit, I tell ye ! 

[Abel puts up his flute, but continues to twiddle dumbly on his 
left middle finger thrust in his mouth.] 
I 'm a square man. I wa'n't chose to be deacon for 
nothin'. I 'm fair and square at catechisin', and Fm 
givin' you one more chanct to answer me back fair 
and square. 

ABEL 
[Saluting.] 

Fair and square. Sir. 

THE DEACON 
Answer me : How much chores have ye arned your 
victuals with, Chuck — well, say, in the last six months? 

ABEL 
[Grinning, sits on the burrow and lilts.] 

How much wood would a woodchuck chuck, 
H a woodchuck would cliuck wood? 



CHUCK y 

THE DEACON 
[Shaken with anger.] 
Damn ye ! Clear out, or V 11 have ye haled back to 
jail. Git ofifn the place! 

[He moves toward Abel.] 

ABEL 

[Springing up, turns sullen again,} 
Guess it 's my place, too! 

THE DEACON 
Ye guess so! 

ABEL 
And my folks too. 

THE DEACON 
Yourn.'^ Ha! 

ABEL 
One o' ye anyhow. 

THE DEACON 
Which? 

ABEL 
The gal — Litty. 

THE DEACON 
Stop : ye dares'nt name her ! The gal ye Ve brought 
to shame in your facher's house ; her as I Mopted when 
her own folks died, and raised her to be the woman in 
my own house, with my own sons— good Lord! — ^and 
to share in the victuals and the chores — 

ABEL 

[Lilting.'] 
And the chores, good Lord, and the cHorest 



8 CHVCK 

THE DEACON 
Yes, the chores: She never shirked 'em till you 
brought her to shame, and made her grow slack, a- 
hankerin' for you and the vanities and lusts of the 
varmin you 'sort with. — And the likes of you my flesh 
and blood — a Dole! 

ABEL 
Dole ! Dole ! Dole ! 
Says the De'il to the dead man's soul! 

THE DEACON 
And look at your brother 'Lijah — town clerk a'ready, 
and redeemed in the Lord's grace: and him a year 
younger. 

ABEL 
Pity I wa'n't born o' legal age, like 'Lijah! 

THE DEACON 
True 'nough: you make me a pretty son and heir, 
don't ye? 

ABEL 
Sun and air 's pretty much all you've give' me io 
grow on. 

THE DEACON 
Yes, thank God for 'Lijah! But you — you 've lie 1 
and you 've drunk; you 've lazed and you 've luste 1 
and you 've stole: you 've stole from your own hon^ : 
folks, and you 've ravished in the house of your fathe- . 
But 'Lijah, your brother, he 's redeemed ye. He ':, 
put ye in jail. 

ABEL 
[Grinning.'\ 
Has he hep' me thar? 



CHUCK 9 

THE DEACON 
And he 's takin' poor Letty to meetin', to marry her 
himself, lawful— this day and mornin'. 

ABEL 
[Taking out his flute.] 
If they git thar !— // they git thar ! 

[He trills a repetition of the lilt.] 

THE DEACON 
[Seising up the gun from the ground.] 
What ye mean by that, ye whistlin' do-no-good ? 

ABEL 
//, says I; ?//— What's the dif? 

THE DEACON 
[Examining the cartridge in the gun, trembles with rage.] 
So ! You was layin' for your own brother with this 
gun, was ye? Now, then, I'm done with ye, for al'ays 
and all. Git out, you lustin' rat, you roUin' stone o' 
Satan, ye! You filanderin', murderin' pest, git outn 
here! Git outn my life, git outn my home and my 
fields. I '11 fodder the likes of ye no more. 
[He raises and aims the gun at Abel, who dodges involun- 
tarily.] 

Git off I 

[Staring at the gun's nossle, Abel backs slowly away, round- 
ing toward the bushes.] 
And I warn ye, Chuck, the last time : Keep in hidin' — 

[Points to the woodchuck's hole.] 
— like him. For if ever I set eyes on ye agin, tres- 
passin' on my acres, I '11 shoot ye, for the ground-hog 



10 CHUCK 

that ye be, and bury ye thar in your own burrer. Git ! 

[Reaching the bowlder, Abel pauses, looking down at it, and 
smiling a quiet, absent-minded smile, seems to forget the 
gun and the glowering deacon. Loosing from his head 
the water-lily pads, he drops them in the ferns by the 
rock. 

Above him, a locust rasps its drowsy midsummer whirr. Lis- 
tening, he stoops, pulls a broad grass-blade, splits it leis- 
urely, lays it between his tivo thumbs, and blows on it — 
through his lips — a bussing, locust-like noise. 

The Deacon, setting his jaw, lets the gun-barrel sink slowly 
to the ground. 

Bussing his grass-blade, Abel idles along the hazel path, and 
disappears. 

The church bell, which has rung at regular intervals, now 
ceases to sound.] 

THE DEACON 
[Climbing the footpath — gun and book in hand — mutters, as 
he goes from sight.] 
Son and heir! Son and heir! 
[From the left now are heard the reverberating tones of a 
church organ, and soon after — the voices of a small con- 
gregation, singing. In the still summer air, the words of 
their hymn are half distinguishable.] 

THE VOICES 
Praise God, from whom all blessings flow; 
Praise Him, all creatures here below; 
Praise Him above, ye heavenly host; 
Praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost! 
Amen! 
[While the voices are singing, Abel reappears from the bushes 
and, lying on his back upon the shady slope, plays an 
answering improvisation on his flute. As he docs so, he 
keeps his eyes fixed on the burrow, out of which ere long 
the head of the woodchuck emerges. Catching sight of it^ 



CHUCK II 

Abel turns over on his stomach, and — still fluting with the 
fingers of one hand — elbows himself, zvith hitches, through 
the huckleberry shrubs, nearer and nearer to the burrow. 
Reaching it, he raises his head suddenly, and grabs with 
one hand. The woodchuck dodges in and disappears. Abel 
scrambles headlong after him into the burrow — his heels 
kicking the air.] 

ABEL 

[Coaxingly.] 
Chuck ! Chuck ! 

[From the right, Voices are heard talking. 
Abel wriggles outward, replaces his heels by his head, rubs 
the fresh earth from his eyes and hair, and peers blinking 
above the embankment, where only his brown head is 
visible.] 

A WOMAN'S VOICE 
[As in pain.] 
I can't, 'Lijah: I just can't go on 't. 

A MAN'S VOICE 
'T ain't only a few rods to the meetin' house. 

[Enter, right, Letty and Elijah. The former is a slight girl, 
in her teens, calm-browed, zvith large, soft eyes. She is 
still in the faint blo.om of an early beauty fragile as an 
hypatica. Signs of drudgery and scant fare, however, are 
beginning to show in the just perceptible stoop of her 
figure and the shape of her hardened hands. She is 
dressed with plain simplicity, except for the white folds 
of a bride's veil, pinned to her hair. 

Elijah, clean-cut of feature, resembles somewhat his father, 
but lacks the Deacon's dignity of years and power. He 
wears a styleless black suit, and speaks with a querulous 
sharpness, tempered at times by a conscious effort to seem 
kinder than he feels. 

Letty, limping, reaches one hand toward Elijah for support, 
but he either does not notice, or ignores, the gesture.] 



X2 CHUCK 

LETTY 
[Pausing, speaks faintly,] 
I 'm so sorry : I can't stand no longer. 

[Swaying, she sinks upon the ground.] 

ELIJAH 
[Uneasily, looking away, left.] 
We 're late. Father 's gone ahead long ago. He 
got acrost safe. Where 's it hurt ye? 

LETTY 

[Painfully.] 
My ankle. When I fell in the brook, it got twisted, 
I guess. 

ELIJAH 
I 'd like to catch the mean-livin' rascal that sawed 
the footbridge. I '11 run him in for 't. 

LETTY 
I *m glad 't was me, anyhow ; and you was behind. 

ELIJAH 
Yes, I was just 'bout to set my foot on 't, when 't 
went down with ye. Lucky you didn't wet your shoes. 

LETTY 

*T was 'most dried up — the brook. 

ELIJAH 
Wonder who did it ! 

[With sudden suspiciousness.] 
Letty! — Was it himf 

LETTY 
[Timidly.] 
Who? 



CHUCK 13 

ELIJAH 
Oh, you know, I guess : you 'd oughter. Well, if it 
's him, I '11 jail him for that over again. 

LETTY 
[Appealingly.] 
Please, but — 

ELIJAH 
[With deliberate politeness.] 
Come, Letitia : I '11 help ye 'long the path. 

LETTY 
I can't. 

ELIJAH 
Can'tf What will ye— set here and get married? 
[Smiling an anemic smile, he extends one hand for her to rise.] 
Guess you ain't calc'latin' on a weddin' by a wood- 
chuck's hole! 

LETTY 
[Trying hard to smile.] 
No; I don't scarcely know what — 

ELIJAH 
Come : the minister's spoke and paid for. It's fixed 
we 're to jine him in the vestry, after meetin' 's out. 

LETTY 
It 's such a pity — 

ELIJAH 
[Stiifening.] 
How? 

LETTY 

I mean — me bein' laid up. 



T4 



CHUCK 



ELIJAH 
Well, you don't reckon I 'm to carry ye, do ye? — 
Smart looks we 'd make at meetin' — me heftin' ye like 
a bale o' hay ! No, thank ye : I 'd never hear the last 
on 't. Come; git up; do! 

LETTY 

[In an agony of emharrassment, tries to stand, but sinks down 
again.] 

'Tain't no use, 'Lijah ; I 'm 'bliged to ask ye to go 
back to the four corners and ask old Miss Dikewell 
to lend me her crutches : she '11 help me out — just to 
get to meetin' and back. 

ELIJAH 
Crutches, ah? 

[Taking out his watch.] 
Quarter past 'leven. You al'ays did make mountains 
outn molehills. 

LETTY 
I 'm so sorry. 

ELIJAH 
[Morosely.] 
Married on crutches ! and next mornin' — the doctor, 
I presume! 

LETTY 
No, 'Lijah— 

ELIJAH 
No, I guess too ! A bad start, I call it. Well, seein' 
ye can't come respectable, I s'pose I 've got to get ye 
the crutches : but mind — no doctor I 

[He goes off along the path, right. 
Letty crouches over her foot in pain. 



CHUCK 

From the woodchuck's hurrozv, Abel zvhistlcs low. 
Letty sits back, pale, and listens. 
Still hidden, Abel sings a snatch:] 

ABEL 
Come 'cross lots, come 'cross lots, 
Says I to Molly, to Molly my gal ! 



15 



Abel! 



Litty ! 



LETTY 
[Starting half to her feet.] 

ABEL 
[In a loud whisper.] 



LETTY 

[Staring about.] 
O Chuck, where be you? 
[Wriggling from the burrow, Abel scrambles down the slope, 
— ardent, and covered with brown earth — and embraces 
her suddenly.] 

ABEL 
It 's me ! 

[He kisses her.] 

LETTY 
[Struggling feebly.] 
No, no! 

[She sinks back helpless, and moans.] 

ABEL 
Gal, what 's hurtin'? Which foot is it? 

LETTY 
[Faintly.] 
Go 'way, quick. 



l6 CHUCK 

ABEL 

[Feeling her ankle.] 
Why, it 's all swole up. 
[Whipping out a jackknife from his pocket, he cuts the shoe- 
laces, deftly slips off the shoe, flings it away, and draws 
off the stocking, while Letty murmurs faintly: "Don't, 
please."] 

It 's cold water 't wants. Wait a bit. 
[Taking the stocking, he dips it in the pool, hurries hack 
with it dripping, and wraps it carefully round the ankle.] 
Smart, doos it? 

[He looks anxiously in her face. She nods. 

Looking quickly round, he sees a tin-can cover, fills it from 

the brook, brings and holds it to her mouth.] 
Swig — jest a mite! 

[She drinks.] 
That 's nice. Onct more. Sun 's hot. 
[She drinks again.] 

LETTY 

[Reviving.] 
Thanks. 

ABEL 
Durn thanks. You won't never forgive me. 

LETTY 
What for? 

ABEL 
T was me: I sawed it. 

LETTY 
Sawed what? 

ABEL 
The foot-bridge. I never reckoned on it bustin* 
through with you. I calc'lated on them. 



CHUCK 17 

LETTY 
Them ? 

ABEL 
The old man, and 'Lijah. With a good ten-foot 
tumble, I calc'lated on a wooden leg apiece. 

LETTY 
[Painfully.'] 
O, Chuck! 

ABEL 
Born fool, me! Might a-knowed Old Nick would 
leave them in luck, and you in the lurch. 

[At her expression, he grows tenderly anxious."] 
Doos it hurt hard, Litty, my gal ? 

LETTY 
I ain't yourn no more, Abel. 

ABEL 
[Quickly.] 
Why not? 

LETTY 
[Touching her veil.] 
Ain't you noticed — this? 

ABEL 
[Starts up, flushing.] 
Yare: I noticed it. 

[He pulls it suddenly from her head. 

With the action, her bright hair falls about her shoulders, and 
she reaches toward him, with a startled cry.] 

LETTY 
Chuck! Chuck! Chuck! What ye doin'? 



l8 CHUCK 

ABEL 

[Rolling the veil into a hall, with both hands.'] 
Now ye see it — 
[He springs to the woodchnck's hole and stuffs the veil in.] 
— and now ye don't! 
[He stands staring at her, as she starts to her knees, with 

outreach ed arms.] 
Goda'mighty! You *re some pretty! 

LETTY 
What '11 I do? 'Lijah *s comin' back. 

ABEL 
[Coming to her.] 
What of it! You 're my gal, ain't ye? 

LETTY 
You Ve broke jail : he '11 put ye back again. 

ABEL 

[Scornfully.] 

Him put me back — I guess! Watch him tryinM 

LETTY 
He '11 tell your father at meetin'. Go 'way, quick. 

ABEL 
[Striding down the path.] 
The meetin' 's goin' to be right here. 

LETTY 
Come back ! The Deacon said he 'd shoot ye, if he 
catched ye again on the place. 

ABEL 
That 's the Deacon's long suit — talk! 



CHUCK 19 

LETTY 

And what *I1 I do without my shoe and my veil ! 

[She starts to limp toward the woodchuck's hole.] 

ABEL 
[Hurrying to her.] 
Stop your goin' on that ankle, Litty. 

LETTY 
[In despair.] 
I can see him now. He 's runnin'. Oh, hide ! Hide, 
quick ! 

ABEL 

If I hide us both, will you be my gal, and not hisn? 

LETTY 
[Throwing her arms about his shoulders, as he lifts her.] 
O, dear! O Chuck! Hide, quick! 

ABEL 
[With a proud smile, bearing her toward the brook.] 
My, your hair! It smells like hazel flowers. 
[Lightly he springs with her into the bed of the brook, and 

disappears behind the bushes. 
They have hardly disappeared, when Elijah comes hurrying 
up the path, tucking the ends of a handkerchief into his 
sweating collar. He carries a pair of crutches. Pausing, 
dumbfounded, he searches about with his eyes.] 

ELIJAH 
[Calling.] 
Letty! Letitia! Where be ye? Letty! 
[Suddenly he darts forward and picks up Letty's shoe from 
the grass. He examines it carefully, pulling out some of 
the cut laces. Then his eyes narrow, his face hardens, 
and he flings the crutches on the ground, with an ugly 



20 CHUCK 

muttering. Pocketing the shoe, he hurries off toward the 
church. For an instant, Abel's head appears through the 
hushes, looking after him. 
Then the faint thunder of the organ rolls once more through 
the orchard, and the sound of the congregation, singing:] 

THE CHURCH VOICES 
All hail the power of Jesus' name, 

Let angels prostrate fall ; 
Bring forth the royal diadem, 
And crown him Lord of all; 

And — crown — him 
Lor — or — ord of all! 

[Through these more distant voices, the voice of Abel, close 
by, sings from behind the bushes, mingling with the organ 
tones.] 

THE VOICE OF ABEL 

Come 'cross lots, come 'cross lots, 

Says I to Molly, to Molly my gal ! 
Joe Pie weed is tall and yeller, 
Cider-pears hang low and meller, 
Stoop down, and scoot t' meet your feller 

Where th' ain't no tattletal'. 

O Joe Pie, Joe Pie, 

If gallin' and gospel don't 'gree, 

We '11 give the good folks the go-by- 
Molly my gal, and me! 

THE CHURCH VOICES 
And — crown — ^h im 
Lor — or — ord of all! 
[The organ still rolls. 
Behind the hushes, the tin flute trills a few notes. Then 



CHUCK 21 

Abel reenters, through the haaels, carrying Letty, in 
whose loosened hair he has stuck white water-lilies and 
cardinal flowers. In her hand she holds a bunch of half- 
opened lily buds. Abel sits on the loiv bowlder — placing 
Letty, a clinging wisp of a girl, beside him. Both her feet 
are now bare.] 

ABEL 
[Starting to sing again.] 
Come 'cross lots — 

LETTY 
[Putting her hand over his mouth.] 
Shh! 

ABEL 
He 's clean out o' hearin'. 
[Wetting his forefinger in his mouth, he holds it in the air.] 
The wind 's from the meetin' house.— Mind where 
you 're settin'? 

LETTY 
[With a happy cry.] 
Why, the bowlder — it 's ourn ! 

ABEL 
Rec'lect, do ye? 

LETTY 
The first time I come 'cross lots, and you met me 
here: O, Chuck! 

ABEL 
The moon come out; and afterwards we waded for 
lilies. 

LETTY 
Lily-time — a year ago! 



22 CHUCK 

ABEL 
And you made head-gear on 'em: the pads for me, 
and the blooms for yourself. Do it agin, gal, wont ye ? 

[Picking up the pads, which he dropped by the bowlder.] 
Look, here 's mine, made aVeady. You 've got the 
star-buds thar. Make yourself a genuine bride-veil, 
will ye? 

LETTY 
If you want me. 

ABEL 
Do I? 

[He caresses her. She begins to weave the wat^r lilies to- 
gether.] 

How 's the off hoof now, little heifer? No more 
hurt feelin'? 

LETTY 
Seems I ain't no feelin' nowheres, 'ceptin' here. 
[She feels of her throat, and swallows.] 

ABEL 
And here? 
[He kisses her on the mouth. She clings to him impetuously.] 

LETTY 
O Chuck ! When he don't find me at meetin', he '11 
fetch your father. 

ABEL 
Not s' long 's the praisin' lasts. Hark: they 're off 
agin. 

[He halloas, to the organ tones:] 
Come 'cross lots, come 'cross lots. 

Says I to Molly, and let down the bars ! 
[The Voices of the congregation resume their singing, white 



CHUCK 23 

Abel — swaying Letty on his knee — carols his counter- 
song.'] 

THE CHURCH VOICES 
Oh, would like yonder sacred throng 

We at His feet might fall, 
And join the everlasting song, 
And crown Him Lord of all ! 

ABEL 
Bull and heifer drink in the meader, 
Boy and gal are tired o' the treader; 
Skin out — when the sky is growin' redder — 
And steal your fun from the stars. 

O Joe Pie, Joe Pie, 

If pairin' and preachin' don't gee, 
We '11 give the good Lord the go-by — 

Molly my gal, and me ! 

THE CHURCH VOICES 
— Lor — or — ord of all ! — A-men ! 
[The organ ceases. There is silence, except for the burring 
of a locust.] 

LETTY 
[In an awed whisper.] 
They 've stopped. He'll be tellin' your father. 

ABEL 
Not yit ; the preachin' 's goin' on. We 've got the 
hull sarmon to lie snug in — snug 's a bug in a rug. 

LETTY 
You guess we 're safe and sure here? 



24 CHUCK 

ABEL 

Safe as salvation, and sure as sinnin'. 

[He fondles her hair, looking happily in her eyes. She 
returns his gaze, yearningly.] 

LETTY 
Boy — and you love me — after all? 

ABEL 
Guess agin. 

[He kisses her.] 

LETTY 
I thought 't was all over. That 's why I took 'Lijah. 
They couldn't a-made me done it nohow, if it hadn't 
a-been — hadn't a-been — for Nan. 

ABEL 
Now don't you fuss 'bout Nan. Nan 's no sort. 
She 's jest a cider gal. 

LETTY 
What 's a cider gal? 

ABEL 
Oh, when Jack takes his drop, he wants his Jill. But 
that ain't lovin*. 

LETTY 
I don't make out. 

ABEL 
No; you wa'n't never drunk: that 's why. I was 
drunk: that 's all. 

LETTY 
[Gently.] 
Wa'n't that 'nough ? 



CHUCK 25 

ABEL 

'Nough for the preachers, I reckon. Ye ain't jined 
them yit, have ye? 

LETTY 

No, Chuck, no. But 'Lijah said how you loved her, 
and your father said how — seein' he 'd 'dopted me — 
my child would have to be born reg'lar into the church 
and the family, and bear the name o' Dole; and so 
'Lijah wanted me for himself; and they was both 
a f card — 

ABEL 

You better bet they was! They was both afeard 
they wouldn't have nobody to do the chores for 
nothin' : no gal to cook and scrub and clean and do the 
milkin'. Skeered o' the chores ; it ^s a family failin' ! 
Born-brother 'Lijah and me, we're twins thar! But 
for gittin' rid o' chores, I'd ruther steal a heifer than a 
gal. 

LETTY 

Oh, that heifer ! When your father missed it from 
the barn, and you was arrested — 

ABEL 
[Gleefully.'] 
Born-brother 'Lijah, he signed the warrant! 

LETTY 

[Grave, and wide-eyed.] 
No! — him? 

ABEL 
[His grin splitting into laughter. 1 
But he bought the heifer! O Lordy! He bought 
back his own heifer for five dollars more *n I sold it 



26 CHUCK 

to Sam Williams for ; and Sam he set up the drinks 
for me, with the balance! 

[Wiping the tears of his laughter.] 
O Lordy ! That was w'uth the price of admittance 
to jail. 

LETTY 
But now you Ve broke loose before trial, what 'II 
happen to ye? 

ABEL 
Never fret. Sam he 's constable, and he won't run 
me in twice, if the homefolks don't pinch me. Mean- 
whiles, with the price of 'Lijah's heifer, I 've bought 
me — 

[He feels in his back pocket.] 
—look! 

[He takes out two bits of cardboard, and holds them merrily 
before her eyes.] 

LETTY 
What 's them? 

ABEL 
Two tickets to the White Mountains — for a weddin' 
spree. 

LETTY 
A weddin' spree? Ourn? 

ABEL 
Wouldn't be 'Lijah's, would it? 

LETTY 
[Casing on the tickets with bewildered happiness.] 
Us two: the White Mountains: O Chuck! 



CHUCK 27 

ABEL 
That 's my signature, and it 's goin' to be yourn 
hencefor'ards, world without end, et cetVy. Jest 
Chuck — ^that 's our new calHn'-card: ABEL CHUCK 
and LITTY CHUCK. The doorplate of old Dole is 
chucked! It 's our call to arms, Litty: Damnation with- 
out remuneration — if that ain't misery, make the most 
on't ! Chuck the home tea-party overboard : Chuck the 
hull shootin' match — chores, church and fam'ly ! Them 
's our stars and stripes, and we '11 hist 'em on that thar 
Bunker's Hill. 

[He points to the woodchuck's mound.] 

LETTY 
[Examining more closely the pieces of cardboard.] 
But they ain't return-tickets! 

ABEL 
What 's the good o* returnin'? 

LETTY 
But where '11 we put up, when the little 'un comes? 

ABEL 
In the deacon's cow -barn ? — I guess not ! No, s^ree ! 
The old man called me a varmin critter: told me to 
pack and jine the other chucks. Wall, so I will, and 
take my mate along. I reckon we can nose for our 
livin' as good as them other gipsies. I 've watched 
'em sence I was so high — the chuckfolks. Durn if I 
don't think they 're happier 'n menfolks. They ain't 
domestic, nor they ain't wild ; but they live on the fat 
o' both stock. 



28 CHUCK 

{Pointing to the burrow.] 
Thar 's that sly old parson o' the pastur' — old Chuck- 
the-dirt: Lordy, ain't I seen him mornin's, with his 
fur bib tucked under his chin, breakfastin' on 'Lijah's 
celery and parsnips, when 'Lijah himself was goin' 
empty-bellied, drivin' his garden stuff t' market. 
Chucks cute? Now I guess! That 's why they're 
cussed by the dlirn-fool housefolks. Housefolks hoe 
and harrer; chuckfolks feed and farrer. Housefolks 
borrer trouble; chuckfolks lend it out at interest. 
Housefolks help the devil; chuckfolks help 'emselves. 
'Course, every beggar must bide his chanct, but I 
guess, Litty, you and me are cute 'nough to dig a snug 
burrer somewhars, and raise up a litter on somebody 
else's lot, whar we can share the crops and dodge the 
taxes. Anyhow, you 're 'cute 'nough lookin' ! 

[He caresses her. Suddenly, she seizes his arm, startled.] 

LETTY 
Listen: what 's that? 

ABEL 

[Listening.] 
What like? 

LETTY 
Like a great bird, screamin' far off, and caliin' — 
callin' to its young uns. 

ABEL 
Like what it is, Litty — callin' to you and me. It 's 
Love-each-other, gal. It 's the great mountain bird 
a-swoopin' down on us. It 's the White Mountain 
train, whistlin' crost the valley. — It '11 be at the Junc- 
tion in ten minutes. 



CHUCK 29 

LETTY 
Are we goin', true 'nough? 

ABEL 
Tuck up your hair. How 's the foot? 

LETTY 
[Joyously.^ 
Oh, I ain't got none : I 'm flyin'. 

ABEL 
Put on your veil, Hly-bride. 
[He helps her fasten the zvoven lilies on her head, he himself 
putting on his former head-gear of lily-pads.] 

LETTY 
But where '11 be the weddin'. There ain't time. 

ABEL 
Th' ain't nothin' but time : ten minutes. 

LETTY 
But where — 

ABEL 

Didn't I say the meetin' would be right here ? 

LETTY 
But where's the proper minister? [With a bright 
thought.] They say, gipsy gals jump over a broom 
to get married. 

ABEL 
[Warningly.] 
Shh ! Don't embarrass his worship. He 's a shy 
sort. 
[Mysteriously, he points to the top of the mound, where the 



30 CHUCK 

woodchiick, partly visible, sits sunning himself on his 
haunches. Abel speaks low.] 

Ain't he proper 'nough? 

LETTY 
Him? What for? 

ABEL 
Why, for the ceremony. He 's the most expensive 
prophet in the county: when he jest stirs out and looks 
at his shadder, the market-folks tremble in their boots. 
But we ain't sparin' expense to-day, Litty. I Ve spoke 
our license from him. So now for the ceremony ! 

LETTY 

[Laughing for the first time — a happy, hysterical, young 
laugh.] 

Ain't you funny, Chuck ! 

ABEL 
Ssh! Not so loud. He '11 stay and jine us, if we 
behave. He 'preciates my comin' without no gun. — 
Now, do as I do. 

[He tiptoes forward; she follows, holding his hand.] 

LETTY 

Chuck, ain't you funny! 

ABEL 

[With a profound bow and boy-like flourish, addresses the 

woodchuck.] 

Reverend Mr. Wood — of the renowned family of 
Chucks — we, male and female, of your honor's own 
kin and communion, bein' nat'ral born sinners (and 
glad of it), poachin' in your honor's parish (off and 
on), for some twenty seasons (more or less), and 



CHUCK 31 

havin' published our banns (from time to time), 
in the presence of chipmunks, woodcocks and water- 
wagtails, duly assembled therefor, do now respect- 
fully petition your experienced worship to unite us, one 
t' other, in the blessin's of wedlock, accordin' to the 
ancient rites and ceremonies of orchard communities. 
Yours truly — Amen! 

[Abel now turns about, and assumes a low, guttural tone.] 
Do you, boy, kiss this gal because ye love her? 

[In his own voice.] 
I do. 

[He kisses Letty. Then speaks again, guttural] 
Do you, gal, kiss this boy, because ye love him ? 
[He nudges Letty.] 

LETTY 
[Shyly.] 

I do. 

[She kisses Abel. 

Through the orchard the church organ begins again to roll.] 

ABEL 
[Guttural.] 
Will you, boy, stick to this gal, so long 's ye love 
her? 

[In his own voice.] 
I will. 

[He hugs Letty; then speaks again, guttural] 

Will you, gal, stick to this boy, so long 's ye love him? 

[He nudges Letty again.] 

LETTY 

[In a low voice.] 
I will. 

[She draws closer to him.] 



32 



CHUCK 



ABEL 

{Guttural.'\ 
Then do I now pronounce you, man-chuck and 
woman-chuck, mates! Kiss, and be kind to your Httle 
chucks. — Amen ! 

ABEL AND LETTY 
[ Together.'] 
Amen ! 

[They kiss each other on the mouth. 
The woodchuck vanishes into his hurrozv. 
From nearby, the Voices of the congregation sing to the organ. 
As they become aware of this, Abel and Letty look at each 
other, listening.] 

THE CHURCH VOICES 
Lord, dismiss us with Thy blessing; 
Fill our hearts with joy and peace; 
Let us each, thy love possessing, 
Triumph in redeeming grace: 
O refresh us, 
O refresh us, 
Traveling through this wilderness. 
A — men ! 

LETTY 

[Tugging at AbeVs arm.] 

Run! Meetin' 's out: Run, Chuck! 

[Hand in hand, they run up the mound, at the top of which 

Letty's ankle gives way, and she sinks down.] 

ABEL 
What — the hoof agin, little heifer? 
[He lifts her in his arms. Holding her a moment, they stand 
gazing off toward the valley, where a long, deep whistle 
sounds.] 



CHUCK 



33 



LETTY 
It 's callin' us, Chuck: the great bird — Love-each- 
other ! 

ABEL 
It 's callin' us to the hills, gal,— the hills ! 

[The report of a gun resounds. 
Abel starts back, and stumbles. 
Letty screams and hides her face. 

Holding her on his left arm, Abel raises his right defiantly, 
and shouts:] 

Never skun me ! 

[Waving toward the church.] 
So long, Brother 'Lijah : The minister 's waitin' ! 

[Putting his thumb to his nose, he twiddles his fingers, mock- 
ingly; then springing with Letty down the further slope, 
he disappears. 

The shadows in the orchard are lengthening. 

A locust rasps in an elm. 

Faint crickets cheep in the grass. 

An oriole flutes from an apple tree. 

From his hole, the woodchuck crawls cautiously out, nosing, 
as he does so, a crumpled and earth-sailed veil, which 
clings to his bristly hair, half clothing him. 

Pulling from his burrow an ear of corn, he sits up on his 
haunches, silently nibbling it— his small eyes half shut in 
the sunshine. 

Faintly from below, sounds the voice of Abel, singing: 

Come 'cross lots, come 'cross lots, 
Says I to Litty, to Litty, my gal ! 
The woodchuck nibbles on. 



CURTAIN. 



GETTYSBURG 

A Woodshed Commentary 



CHARACTERS 



LINK TADBOURNE, ox-yoke maker. 
POLLY, his grandniece. 



The Place is country New Hampshire, at the present time. 



GETTYSBURG* 

SCENE: 

A woodshed, in the ell of a farm house. 

The shed is open on both sides, front and hack, the apertures 
being slightly arched at the top. [In bad weather, these 
presumably may be closed by big double doors, which stand 
open now — swung back outzvard beyond sight.] Thus the 
nearer opening is the proscenium arch of the scene, under 
which the spectator looks through the shed to the back- 
ground — a grassy yard, a road with great trunks of soar- 
ing elms, and the glimpse of a green hillside. The ceiling 
runs up into a gable with large beams. 

On the right, at back, a door opens into the shed from the 
house kitchen. Opposite it, a door leads from the shed 
into the barn. In the foreground, against the right wall, 
is a work-bench. On this are tools, a long, narrow, wooden 
box, and a small oil stove, with steaming kettle upon it. 

Against the left wall, what remains of the year's wood supply 
is stacked, the uneven ridges sloping to a jumble of stove- 
wood and kindlings mixed with small chips on the floor, 
which is piled deep with mounds of crumbling bark, chips 
and wood-dust. 

Not far from this mounded pile, at right centre of the scene, 
stands a wooden arm-chair, in which Link Tadbourne, 
in his shirt-sleeves, sits drowsing. Silhouetted by the 
sunlight beyond, his sharp-drawn profile is that of an old 
man, with white hair cropped close, and grey moustache 
*Copyright, 1912, by Percy MacKaye. All rights reserved. 

37 



38 GETTYSBURG 

of a faded black hue at the outer edges. Between his 
knees is a stout thong of wood, whittled round by the 
drawshave which his sleeping hand still holds in his lap. 
Against the side of his chair rests a thick wooden yoke 
and collar. Near him is a chopping-block. 

In the woodshed there is no sound or motion except the hum 
and floating steam from the tea-kettle. Presently the 
old man murmurs in his sleep, clenching his hand. Slowly 
the hand relaxes again. 

From the door, right, comes Polly — a sweet-faced girl of 
seventeen, quietly mature for Jier age. She is dressed 
simply. In one hand, she carries a man's zuide-brimmed 
felt hat; over the other arm, a blue coat. These she 
brings toward Link. Seeing him asleep, she begins to 
tiptoe, lays the coat and hat on the chopping-block, goes 
to the bench and trims the wick of the oil-stove, under 
the kettle. Then she returns and stands near Link, sur- 
veying the shed. 

On closer scrutiny, the jumbled woodpile has evidently a cer- 
tain order in its chaos: some of the splittings have been 
piled in irregular ridges; in places, the deep layer of 
wood-dust and chips has been scooped, and the little 
mounds slope and rise like miniature valleys and hills.'^ 

Taking up a hoe, Polly — with careful steps — moves among 
the hollows, placing and arranging sticks of kindling, 
scraping and smoothing the little mounds with the hoe. 

As she does so, from far away, a bugle sounds. 

* A suggestion for the appropriate arrangement of these mounds 
may be found in the map of the battle-field annexed to the volume by 
Capt. R. K. Beecham, entitled "Gettysburg," A. C. McClurg, 191 1. 



GETTYSBURG 39 

LINK 
[Snapping his eyes wide open, sits up.1 
Hello! Cat-nappin' was I, Polly? 

POLLY 

Just 
a kitten-nap, I guess. 

[Laying the hoe down, she approaches.} 
The yoke done? 

LINK 
[Giving a final whittle to the yoke-collar thong.} 

Thar! 
When he's ben steamed a spell, and bended snug, 
I guess this feller '11 sarve t' say ''Gee" to — 

[Lifting the other yoke-collar from beside his chair, he holds 
the whittled thong next to it, comparing the two with 
expert eye.] 

and "Haw" to him. Beech every time, Sir ; beech 
or walnut. Hang me if I 'd shake a whip 
at birch, for ox-yokes. — Polly, are ye thar? 

POLLY 
Yes, Uncle Link. 

LINK 
What's that I used to sing ye? 
"Polly, put the kittle on, 
Polly, put the kittle on, 
Polly, put the kittle on—" 
[Chuckling.] 
We'll give this feller a dose of ox-yoke tea ! 

POLLY 
The kettle 's boilin'. 



40 GETTYSBURG 

LINK 

Wall, then, steep him good. 

[Polly takes from Link the collar-thong, carries it to the 
work-bench, shoves it into the narrow end of the box, 
which she then closes tight and connects — by a piece of 
hose — to the spout of the kettle. At the further end of 
the box, steam then emerges through a small hole.] 

POLLY 

You 're feelin' smart to-day. 

LINK 

Smart!— Wall, if I 
could git a hull man to swap legs with me, 
mebbe I 'd arn my keep. But this here settin* 
dead an' alive, without no legs, day in, 
day out, don't make an old hoss wuth his oats. 

POLLY 
[Cheerfully.] 
I guess you 'II soon be walkin' round. 

LINK 

Not if 
that doctor feller has his say: He says 
I can't never go agin this side o' Jordan ; 
and looks like he 's 'bout right. — Nine months to- 

morrer, 
Polly* gal, sence I had that stroke. 

POLLY 
[Pointing to the ox-yoke.] 

You 're fitter 
sittin' than most folks standin'. 



GETTYSBURG 41 

LINK 
[Briskly.] 

Oh, they can't 
keep my two hands from makin' ox-yokes. That 's 
my second natur' sence I was a boy. 

[Again in the distance a bugle sounds. Link starts.\ 

What 's that? 

POLLY 

Why, that *s the army veterans 
down to the graveyard. This is Decoration 
mornin' : you ain't forgot ? 

LINK 

So 't is, so 't is. 
Roger, your young man — ha! [Chuckling] he come 

and axed me 
was I agoin' to the cemetery. 

^'Me? Don't I look it?" says L Ha! "Don't I look 
it?'* 

POLLY 

He meant — to decorate the graves. 

LINK 

O' course; 
but I must take my little laugh. I told him 
I guessed I wa'n't per sent 'ble anyhow, 
my mustache and my boots wa'n't blacked this mornin'. 
I don't jest like t' talk about my legs. — 
Be you a-goin' to take your young school folks, 
Polly? 

POLLY 

Dear no ! I told my boys and girls 
to march up this way with the band. I said 



42 GETTYSBURG 

I 'd be a-stayin' home and learnin' how 

to keep school in the woodpile here with you. 

LINK 
{Looking lip at her proudly.'] 
Schoolma'am at seventeen! Some smart, I tell ye! 

POLLY 

[Caressing him.] 
School-master, you, past seventy; that 's smarter! 
I tell 'em I learn from you, so 's I can teach 
my young folks what the study-books leave out. 

LINK 
Sure ye don't want to jine the celebratin'? 

POLLY 
No Sir! We 're goin' to celebrate right here, 
and you 're to teach me to keep school some more. 
[She holds ready for him the blue coat and hat.] 

LINK 
[Looking up.] 
What'sthar? 

POLLY 
Your teachin' rig. 
[She helps him on with it.] 

LINK 

The old blue coat! — 
My, but I 'd like to see the boys : 

[Gazing at the hat.] 

the Grand 
Old Army Boys! [Dreamily] Yes, we was boys: jest 
boys! 



< 



GETTYSBURG 43 

Polly, you tell your young folks, when they study 
the books, that we was nothin' else but boys 
jest fallin' in love, with best gals left t' home— ^ 
the same as you ; and when the shot was singin', 
we pulled their pictur's out, and prayed to them 
'most more 'n the Allmighty. 

[Link looks up suddenly— a strange light in his face. Again, 
to a far strain of music, the bugle sounds.] 

Thar she blows 

Agin ! 

POLLY 
They 're marchin' to the graves with flowers. 

LINK 
My Godfrey ! 't ain't no much thinkin' o' flowers 
and the young folks, their faces, and the blue 
line of old fellers marchin'— it 's the music ! 
that old brass voice a-callin' ! Seems as though, 
legs or no legs, I 'd have to up and foller 
to God-knows-whar, and holler— holler back 
to guns roarin' in the dark. No ; durn it, no! 
I jest can't stan' the music. 

POLLY 

[Goes to the work-bench, where the box is steaming.] 

Uncle Link, 
you want that I should steam this longer? 

LINK 

[Absently.] 

Oh, 

A kittleful, a kittleful. 



44 



GETTYSBURG 



POLLY 
[Coming over to him.] 
Now, then, 
I *m ready for school. — I hope I Ve drawed the map 
all right. 

LINK 

Map? Oh, the map! 
[Surveying the woodpile r e minis cently, he nods.'\ 

Yes, thar she be: 
old Gettysburg! 

POLLY 
I know the places — most. 

LINK 
S9, do ye ? Good, now : whar *s your marker ? 

POLLY 
[Taking up the hoe.] 

Here. 
LINK 
Willoughby Run: whar 's that? 

POLLY 
[Points with the hoe toivard the left of the woodpile.] 

That *s farthest over 
next the barn door. 

LINK 

My, how we fit the Johnnies 
thar, the fust mornin' ! Jest behind them willers, 
acrost the Run, that 's whar we captur'd Archer. 
My, my! 

POLLY 
Over there — that 's Seminary Ridge. 



GETTYSBURG 



45 



[She points to different heights and depressions, as Link 
nods his approval.^ 

Peach Orchard, Devil's Den, Round Top, the Wheat- 
field— 

LINK 
Lord, Lord, the Wheatfield ! 

POLLY 
[C ontinuing.l 

Cemetery Hill, 
Little Round Top, Death Valley, and this here 
is Cemetery Ridge. 

LINK 
[Pointing to the little flag.] 
And colors flyin' ! 
We kep 'em flyin' thar, too, all three days, 
from start to finish. 

POLLY 
Have I learned 'em right? 

LINK 
A number One, chick ! Wait a mite : Culp's Hill : 
I don't jest spy Culp's Hill. 

POLLY 

There wa'n't enough 
kindlin's to spare for that. It ought to lay 
east there, towards the kitchen. 

LINK 

Let it go ! 
That 's whar us Yanks left our back door ajar 
and Johnson stuck his foot in : kep it thar, 
too, till he got it squoze off by old Slocum. 



46 GETTYSBURG 

Let Gulp's Hill lay for now. — Lend me your marker. 
[Polly hands him the hoc. From his chair, he reaches with it 

and digs in the chips.] 
Death Valley needs some scoopin' deeper. So : 
smooth off them chips. 

[Polly does so with her foot.] 

You better guess 't was deep 
as hell, that second day, come sundown. — Here, 

[He hands back the hoe to her.] 
flat down the Wheatfield yonder. 
[Polly does so.] 

Goda'mighty ! 
that Wheatfield : wall, we flatted it down flatter 
than any pancake what you ever cooked, 
Polly ; and 't wan't no maple syrup neither 
was runnin', slippery hot and slimy black 
all over it, that nightfall. 

POLLY 

Here 's the road 
to Emmetsburg. 

LINK 
No, 'tain't : this here 's the pike 
to Taneytown. where Sykes's boys come sweatin', 
after an all-night march, jest in the nick 
to save our second day. The Emmetsburg 
road 's thar. — Whar was I, 'fore I fell cat-nappin'? 

POLLY 
At sunset, July second. Sixty-three. 

LINK 

[Nodding, reminiscent.] 

The Bloody Sundown! God, that crazy sun: 



GETTYSBURG 47 

she set a dozen times that afternoon, 
red-yeller as a pimkin jacko'lantern, 
rairin' and pitchin' through the roarin' smoke 
till she clean busted, like the other bombs, 
behind the hills. 

POLLY 
My ! Wa'n't you never scart 
and wished you 'd stayed t' home? 

LINK 

Scart? Wall, I wonder! 
Chick, look a-thar : them little stripes and stars. 
I heerd a feller onct, down to the store, — 
a dressy mister, span-new from the city — 
layin' the law down: "All this stars and stripes/' 
says he, ''and red and white and blue is rubbish, 
mere sentimental rot, spread-eagleism!" 
"I wan't f know !" says I. "In Sixty-three, 
I knowed a lad, named Link. Onct, after sundown 
I met him stumblin' — with two dead men's muskets 
for crutches — towards a bucket, full of ink — 
water, they called it. When he 'd drunk a spell, 
he tuk the rest to wash his bullet holes. — 
Wall, sir, he had a piece o* splintered stick, 
with red and white and blue, tore 'most t' tatters, 
a-danglin' from it. "Be you color sergeant?" 
says I. "Not me," says Link ; "the sergeant 's dead, 
but when he fell, he handed me this bit 
o' rubbish— red and white and blue." And Link 
he laughed. "What be you laughin' for?" says I. 
"Oh, nothin'. Aint it lovely, though !" says Link. 



48 GETTYSBURG 

POLLY 
What did the span-new mister say to that? 

LINK 
I didn't stop to listen. Them as never 
heerd dead men calHn* for the colors don*t 
guess what they be. 

[Sitting up and blinking hard.] 

But this ain't keepin' school ! 

POLLY 

[Quietly.] 
I guess I 'm learnin' somethin', Uncle Link. 

LINK 

The second day, 'fore sunset. 

[He takes the hoe and points with it.] 

Yon's the Wheatfield. 
Behind it thar lies Longstreet with his rebels. 
Here be the Yanks, and Cemetery Ridge 
behind 'em. Hancock — he 's our general — 
he 's got to hold the Ridge, till reinforcements 
from Taneytown. But lose the Wheatfield, lose 
the Ridge, and lose the Ridge — lose God-and-all ! — 
Lee, the old fox, he 'd nab up Washington, 
Abe Lincoln and the White House in one bite ! — 
So the Union, Polly, — me and you and Roger, 
your Uncle Link, and Uncle Sam — is all 
thar — growin' in that Wheatfield. 

POLLY 

[Smiling proudly.] , 

And they 're growin* 
still! 



GETTYSBURG 



49 



LINK 
Not the wheat, though. Over them stone walls, 
thar comes the Johnnies, thick as grasshoppers : 
gray legs a-jumpin' through the tall wheat tops. 
And now thar ain't no tops, thar ain't no wheat, 
thar ain't no lookin' : jest blind f eelin' round 
in the black mud, and trampin' on boys' faces, 
and grapplin' with hell-devils, and stink o' smoke, 
and stingin' smother, and — up thar through the dark — 
that crazy punkin sun, like an old moon 
lopsided, crack.in' her red shell with thunder ! 
[In the distance, a bugle sounds, and the low martial music 
of a brass band begins. Again Link's face tmitches, and 
he pauses, listening. From this moment on, the sound 
and emotion of the brass music, slowly growing louder, 
permeates the scene.] 

POLLY 
Oh ! What was God a-thinkin' of, t' allow 
the created world to act that awful ? 

LINK 

Now, 
I wonder ! — Cast your eye along this hoe : 
[He stirs the chips and wood-dirt round with the hoe-iron.] 
Thar in that poked up mess o' dirt, you see 
yon weeny chip of ox-yoke? — That 's the boy 
I spoke on : Link, Link Tadbourne : "Chipmunk Link," 
they call him, 'cause his legs is spry 's a squirrel's. — 
Wall, mebbe some good angel, with bright eyes 
like yourn, stood lookin' down on him that day, 
keepin' the Devil's hoe from crackin' him. 

[Patting her hand, which rests on his hoe.] 
If so, I reckon, Polly, it was you. 



50 GETTYSBURG 

But mebbe jest Old Nick, as he sat hoein' 

them hills, and haulin' in the little heaps 

o' squirmin' critters, kind o' reco'nized 

Link as his livin' image, and so kep him 

to put in an airthly hell, whar thar ain't no legs, 

and worn-out devils sit froze in high-backed chairs, 

list'nin' to bugles — bugles — bugles, callin'. 

[Link clutches the sides of his chair, staring. The music 
draws nearer. Polly touches him soothingly.] 

POLLY 
Don't, dear ; they '11 soon quit playin'. Never mind 'em. 

LINK 
[Relaxing under her touch.'] 
No, never mind ; that 's right. It 's jest that onct — 
onct v^^e was boys, onct we was boys — with legs. 
But never mind. An old boy ain't a bugle. 
Onct, though, he was : and all God's life a-snortin' 
outn his nostrils, and Hell's mischief laughin' 
outn his eyes, and all the mornin' winds 
ablowin' Glory Hallelujahs, like 
brass music, from his mouth. — But never mind ! 
'T ain't nothin': boys in blue ain't bugles now. 
Old brass gits rusty, and old underpinnin' 
gits rotten, and trapped chipmunks lose their legs. 

[With smouldering fire.] 
But jest the same — 

[His face convulses and he cries out, terribly — straining in 
his chair to rise.] 

— for holy God, that band ! 
Why don't they stop that band ! 



GETTYSBURG 51 

POLLY 
[Going.l 

I '11 run and tell them. 
Sit quiet, clear. I '11 be right back. 

[Glancing hack anxiously, Polly disappears outside. The ap- 
proaching hand hegins to play "John Brown's Body.'* 
Link sits motionless, gripping his chair.] 

LINK 

Set quiet! 

Dead folks don't set, and livin' folks kin stand, 

and Link — he kin set quiet. — Goda'mighty, 

how kin he set, and them a-marchin' thar 

with old John Brown ? Lord God, you ain't forgot 

the boys, have ye? the boys, how they come marchin' 

home to ye, live and dead, behind old Brown, 

a-singin' Glory to ye ! Jest look down : 

thar 's Gettysburg, thar 's Cemetery Ridge: 

don't say ye disremember them! And thar 's 

the colors: Look, he 's picked 'em up — the sergeant's 

blood splotched 'em some — ^but thar they be, still flyin' ! 

Link done that : Link — the spry boy, what they call 

Chipmunk: you ain't forgot his double-step, 

have ye? 

[Again he cries out, heseechingly.] — 

My God, why do You keep on marchin' 
and leave him settin' here? 

[To the music outside, the voices of children begin to sing 
the words of "John Brown's Body." At the sound, 
Link's face hecomes transformed with emotion, his hody 
shakes and his shoulders heave and straighten.] 

No ! — I — won't — set ! 



52 



GETTYSBURG 



[Wresting himself mightily, he rises from his chair, and 
stands.] 

Them are the boys that marched to Kingdom-Come 

ahead of us, but we keep fallin' in Hne. 

Them voices — Lord, I guess you 've brought along 

your Sunday choir of young angel folks 

to help the boys out. 

[Following the music with swaying arms.] 

Glory! — Never mind 
me singin* : you kin drown me out. But I 'm 
goin' t' jine in, or bust! 

[Joining with the children's voices, he moves unconsciously 
along the edge of the woodpile. With stiff steps — his one 
hand leaning on the hoe, his other reached as to unseen 
hands, that draw him — he totters toward the sunlight and 
the green lawn, at back. As he does so, his thin, cracked 
voice takes up the battle-hymn where the children's are 
singing it:] 

" — a-mould'rin* in the grave, 
John Brown's body lies a-mould'rin' in the grave, 
John Brown's body lies a-mould'rin' in the grave, 
But his soul goes — " 

[Suddenly he stops, aware that he Is walking, and cries aloud, 
astounded:] 

Lord, Lord, my legs! 
Whar did Ye git my legs ? 

[Shaking with delight, he drops his hoe, seises up the little 
flag from the woodpile, and waves it joyously.] 

I 'm comin', boys ! 
Link 's loose agin : Chipmunk has sprung his trap. 

[With tottering gait, he climbs the little mound in the 
woodpile.] 



GETTYSBURG 



53 



Now, boys, three cheers for Cemetery Ridge! 
Jine in, jine in! 

[Swinging the flag.] 
Hooray ! — Hooray ! — Hooray ! 

[Outside, the music grows louder, and the voices of old 
men and children sing martially to the brass music. 

With his final cheer, Link stumbles down from the mound, 
brandishes in one hand his hat, in the other the little flag, 
and stumps off toward the approaching procession into 
the sunlight, joining his old cracked voice, jubilant, with 
the singers:] 

" — ry hallelujah. 
Glory, glory hallelujah. 
His truth is marchin' on !" 



CURTAIN. 



THE ANTICK 

A Wayside Sketch 



CHARACTERS 



JONAS BOUTWELL: minister. 

JOHN HALE: a young farmer, 

MRS. CASSANDRA WHITE: a widow, 

MYRTLE: her daughter. 

JULIE BONHEUR: a Canuck girl 

Numerous Anticks"^ and Horribles, 



The TIME is late in the nineteenth century, before automo- 
biles: the PLACE— a dusty country road, in Massachu- 
setts, early in July. 

*The customary spelling of this word in Massachusetts, corresponding 
to its pronunciation there, is Antiques. The grotesque participators 
in the Bunker Hill Day celebrations at Charlestown as >yell as similar 
Fourth of July celebrators, are so called— and spelled. Since, however, 
the word does not, in this connotation mean "old, or ancient," but 
is undoubtedly a survival of the terni applied to Old England's 
merry-andrews or "anticks," [the Fools of the old plays], therefore the 
older form of spelling and pronunciation has been adopted in the 
title and stage-directions of this play. In the mouths of its characters, 
however "antiques" has been used, in accordance with New England 



custom. 



56 



THE ANTICK* 

Along the back of the scene runs an old stone wall, well pre- 
served and partly covered with three-leafed ivy; beyond 
this, across a field of standing grass, peers a little wood 
of birches, popples and pitch-pines, topped by the rounded 
summit of a distant hill. Between the road and the wall 
grows a broad fringe of grass, through which — amid milk- 
weed, daisies and Queen Anne's lace — a worn footpath 
accompanies the road. Another narrower grass-fringe 
skirts the front of the scene. 

On the left [of the spectator], rise the trunks of great sugar- 
maples, that form an arcade of green boughs, framing the 
scene on that side. 

In the right foreground, the road widens with a curve for a 
stopping-place beside a stone watering-trough, shaded by 
white birch trees and wild poplars. 

Above it, is a narrow banking of grass. A thin stream of 
water slips from the moss of a hollowed half -log into 
this trough, brimming its shallow basin, and — glistening 
down the broad, slippery surface, across a chiselled motto 
-^rips to a runnel in the grass. 

Beside the trough, a plain wooden settle stands in the shade. 
Across the road from this, in the right middleground, two 
flagstone steps lead to a little white gate, with pickets, 
almost hidden among tall lilac bushes, behind which is 
just discernible the gable-top of a small, white house, set 
back from the roadside. 

In the hot morning sutishine, soft billowy cloudcaps are begin- 
ning to trail slow shadows across the landscape. 

Remote and intermittent, a sound like subdued thunder re- 
curs. In the intervals, from beyond the maples outside, 
the occasional tink-tink of a cow-bell comes from close 
by. Probably, a cow, unseen, is cropping by the wayside. 
•Copyright, 19 12, by, Percy MacKaye. All rights reserved. 

57 



58 THE AN TICK 

On the right, an odd figure in black is trudging slowly, and 
with many standstills, in the direction of the hell. It is 
a spare, slightly stooped old man, clad in an ancient, long- 
tailed coat and rumpled trousers. Out of doors, even 
when he is driving his cow to pasture. Minister jonas 
BOUTWELL always wears his silk "stovepipe" hat pulled 
amply down on the iron-grey curls, that straggle about 
his ears. His deep-cut vest is habitually half buttoned, 
and just now his not-too-white necktie dangles, half tied, 
from his turn-over collar. 

His gait is rambling, and at times he stubs a toe in the dust, 
or against a grass rut, for his sharp, dancing eyes are 
glued to the pages of a book. This he holds close to his 
spectacles, gripped in both hands, from one of which a 
knotted walking-stick points at an angle skyward. 

As he reads, his lips mutter half audibly, his bushy eyebrows 
are raised and contorted, and his face glasses like a child's 
the emotions roused by his reading. 

While he is doing thus, John Hale enters — left — along the 
road, also reading from a book, silently to himself. 
John is a strong-knit young man of middle height, with 
light, waving hair, wide brow and earnest eyes. He is 
dressed in farming clothes. His manner is quiet, repress- 
ed, but sensitive and conscious of personal power. He 
walks leisurely, as wholly absorbed in his own volume as 
the minister with his; so that he alm.ost stumbles against 
the old man, just as Jonas, inverting his stick, makes a 
flourish, that knocks the volume out of the hands of John, 
who looks up astonished.] 



THE ANTICK 59 

JOHN 

[Exclaiming.'] 

Well, now! — 

[Picking up his own volume from the road, John blows upon it 
carefully, wiping it with his sleeve.] 

Poor old Emerson ! 

JONAS 

How 's that? Ralph Waldo in the dust? Never, 
Sir! 

[Pointing his stick upward.] 

He sits immortal in the empyrean ! 

[Taking the book from John and turning its pages.] 

"Nature," "Idealism," "Spirit": — chewing your old 
Concord cud, John! — That 's good, that 's good: but 
cud 's not clover, boy. Why don't you kick up your 
heels, on the Glorious Fourth? 

[The muffled thunder recurs.] 

Hear that! Don't that make ye feel your gunpowder 
oats? 

JOHN 

[Obliviously intent on the minister's volume.] 
Old plays? 

JONAS 
[Fondling it.] 

Yes, yes: — an old failing, an old failing? The 
Muse, the Muse is my psalm and my commandment! 
Therefore do I play hookie, John, from my parish 



6o THE AN TICK 

widows, and woo the Eternal Feminine in Elizabethan 
pastures. You play hookie too, John: Where 's your 
Faithful, eh? where 's yours? Have you wooed and 
won yet? 

A SHRILL VOICE 

[From behind the lilacs.] 

Jonas! Jonas Boutwell! Your cow *s a-stretchin* 
over my wall and eatin' of my timothy-grass. 

JOHN 
[Laconically,] 
Yes, sir; I *ve wooed and won. 

JONAS 

[Blankly.] 

Not— in there? 

[John nods.] 

THE VOICE 
Drive the critter off! 

JONAS 

[Bowing to the lilacs.] 

Madam, your obedient servant! 

[Beckoning solemnly with his walking-stick, he speaks in a 
higher key.] 

Bos, bos, CO*, bossie ! Ga 'lang, Doll ! 

[Searching for something to throw, he takes from his pocket 
an old glove, and flings it toward the maples, where it 
falls short.] 

Clover 'cross the way, Dollie. Try clover! 



THE ANTICK 6l 

THE VOICE 
Patience' sake! 

[Behind the hushes, a door hangs audibly.] 

JONAS 
[Turns preternaturally to John.] 

Not — her! 

• JOHN 

Her girl. 

JONAS 

Worse yet: The offspring of Cassandra? 

JOHN 
Myrtle White. 

JONAS 
Forbid it, angels! 

JOHN 
[ Wearily.] 

I presume we '11 be coming up soon to get you to 
join us. 

JONAS 

Me! Me minister to this dilution of man! Why, 
the mother is vinegar and the daughter is whey. The 
butter soured when she was churned. 

JOHN 
[Wryly.] 

Well, she 's real old Yankee stock. — And 
we're engaged. 



62 THE ANTICK 

JONAS 

Even so: The way of the young man is beset with 
girlhood ! 

JOHN 

Seems to be the only way out. I 'm twenty-five, Sir. 
College — that 's over. Father [biting his lip] — he's 
gone. Mother 's laid up and needs help: some one to 
keep round with her, when I 'm choring. So it 's up 
to me to marry for her sake: to "settle down" and 
plough and milk and sow — 

JONAS 

Yea, even so, John Hale ! — to sow live seed in these 
infecund acres! The seed of Plymouth is scattered 
inland: it teems in the harvests of the West. 
But the old home lots are void and run to sorrel ; the 
old home ells are stale with the smell of left-overs ; the 
old home breed is mash in the cider-press, and their 
sap is vinegar. 

JOHN 
[With a stifled glow.] 

Good God, Sir, don't I know it! Don't you think 
I've wanted to light out, too, for Alaska or Hawaii. 
But here 's Mother, left alone, rooted to the old place 
— wants to die here. 'T isn't pick and choose. I 've 
looked through the other left-overs. Myrtle is the only 
young girl — that is, good girl — in town. 

JONAS 

Good! Good? Lord, what is good in Thy sight? 
"My beloved is mine and I am his, 
He feedeth his flock among the lilies. . . . 



THE ANTICK 63 

Behold thou art fair, my love, 
Behold thou art fair : 
Thine eyes are as doves." 

JOHN 
[Turning away.] 

Don't— Don't ! 

JONAS 

*'0 daughters of Jerusalem, I am sick with love, 
For my head is filled with dew. . . . 
I am my beloved's and he is mine. 
I would kiss thee, yea, and none would despise me; 
I would lead thee and bring thee into my mother's 
house." 

JOHN 

Don't, Sir — for God's sake! I can't stand it. 

[He goes to the watering trough, resting his head on the 
stone.] 

JONAS 

Don't— iov God's sake! Don't stand it! That 's 
what ails us all. The Lord is the tempter of life, but 
our virtues scorn his allurements. He tempts us with 
the lute strings of Joy, he beckons us with the bent bow 
of Cupid, he despatches his servant Satan to beguile 
us with beauty to his pasturage: ''He feedeth his flock 
among the lilies." 

JOHN 

Stop, stop ! You *re playing the devil with me. 

JONAS 
The devil plays Diogenes with me, John. Up and 



64 THE ANTICK 

down, from Sabbath to Sabbath, searching for true 
sinners — and nary a catch ! And so I crawl back into 
my barrel of sermons. — Out on us — all ! There are no 
more sinners in New England: They Ve all gone to 
heaven — or New York. 

JOHN 
Here 's one. 

JONAS 
[Brightening.'] 
John! May I thank God for ye? 

JOHN 

You know my temptation. Well, I 'm done with 
that now — for always. I Ve put it behind me. 

JONAS 

Retro me, Sathanas! Lord, but it sounds sweet 
again! Get thee behind me! 

[Abruptly, with tender command. 1 

Where is she? 

JOHN 

That's over, I tell you. I Ve got to marry Myrtle. 
It 's my duty. 

JONAS 
[Peering above his spectacles, keenly.] 
Where 's Julie? 
[John makes no answer, but gnaws the edge of his finger.] 
Julie Bonheur? 



THE ANTICK 65 

JOHN 
[With repression.] 
I Ve not seen her — for a week. 

JONAS 

In seven days made He the world, and the firma- 
ment thereof with fire, and man, and woman. 

JOHN 
She *s gone out of my Hfe. 

JONAS 
Where to? 



To the bad! 



Not to Boston ! 



JOHN 

JONAS 

[Twinkling.] 



JOHN 
[Tragically.] 

It 's no joke. She — she 's untrue. I Ve broken with 
her. 

JONAS 
[With gentle sternness.] 
You Ve broken her, you mean, John. 

JOHN 
That *s past mending. 

JONAS 
Past marrying? 



66 THE ANTICK 

JOHN 

[Flushing.] 

What — now! I tell you, she 's gone with another — 
a Canuck: [bitterly] one of her own kind! God, I 
could have killed her — and myself. 

JONAS 
Louis Fourteenth was King of Canucks! Don't I 
remember a song? 

"I am king with a kiss. 

Though my crown be a crux: 
For the queen of my bliss 
Is the queen of Canucks!" 

The poet, he was one JohH Hale; wasn't he? 

JOHN 
You might spare me — digging up graves. Goodbye. 

JONAS 
[Holding him, affectionately.] 
Now, now, John : you must tell me ! 

JOHN 
[Dogged and dejected.] 
What? 

JONAS 

Aren't you, come now, just a mite — fool jealous? 



JOHN 
[Darkly.] 



No! 



THE ANTICK 67 

JONAS 
[Cheerfully.] 
Well, then, tell me. 

JOHN 

[Swallowing for a moment.] 

Why, then — first, it was Mother. She wouldn't have 
her, on any grounds : said I ought to stick to my own 
stock; all that. I never saw her quite so: she actually 
cursed Julie. 

JONAS 

Hm ! No wonder neither ! What did you do ? 

JOHN 
I told Julie. 

JONAS 

So! What did she do? 

JOHN 
[Pauses a moment; then with bitterness.] 

She laughed! 

JONAS 

Hm ! No wonder neither ! What then ? 
JOHN 

Then she got drunk. That Canuck fellow, Pierre, 
was with her. Both got drunk. What could I expect 
of a saloon girl, with a mill-hand! [Passionately.] 
Ah, but I thought she was different, and I loved her! 

JONAS 
[Ruminating.] 
Wine, eh? 



68 THE ANTICK 

JOHN 
Yes, they all drink it — her folks. 

JONAS 

Our folks prefer rum — or wood alcohol! 

JOHN 
[Hoarsely, standing away.l 
You are speaking of my father ? Is this a time for — 
JONAS 

For the truth? May be truth has its time, John. I 
loved your father. He was bookish, like me — and 
you. We half-alivers run to books — or Bedlam. Your 
father run to both. 

[With gentle firmness.'] 

Do you want to know zvhy he drunk it — and hanged 
himself in the barn? 

JOHN 
[Flinching, pale, hut returning his gaze.] 

Why? 

JONAS 

You 're sure-enough set, eh, to marry Myrtle? 

JOHN 
Yes. 

JONAS 

[Quietly, with deep feeling.] 
He loved — a Canuck girl. 

JOHN 
My father? [Quivering.] Before — he married? 



THE ANTICK 69 

JONAS 
Yes — and after. 

JOHN 

[Murmurs.^ 
After ! 

[From away left, a distant clamor begins: the beat of a drum, 
the faint squealing of fifes, shouting and the blowing of 
horns. Gradually the sounds grow louder.'] 

JONAS 

She was a wild, healthy thing, all alive — like your 
Julie. And looks! — well, the fair Shulamite wasn't 
fairer to Solomon. So he was about to take her in 
marriage, but about then, your grandfather Hale — 
[Jonas gives a queer smile."] 
JOHN 
[Faintly.] 
No! Not—-? 

JONAS 

Yes, sir ; yes ! ''Stick to your own stock,*' says he. 
''Farmers we may be and country folks, but Adamses 
we are, and Hales, and Brad fords : The breed of Salem 
and Bunker Hill crossed with Canucks? Shades of 
the Mayflower forefend ! — And they forefended ! 
Crossbreeding isn't their legacy. Your father was 
shamed — shamed into it, John; and so he deserted 
your mother. 

JOHN 

My mother? The Canuck — you mean. 

JONAS 
What did I say? 



70 THE ANTICK 

JOHN 

No matter. How long after — did he marry my 
mother ? 

JONAS 
[With a far-off stare.] 
He never married her. 

JOHN 
[Starting.] 
What ! — Oh, you mean the Canuck again. 

JONAS 
[Slowly.] 
Yes, the Canuck I mean. But he raised her child. 

JOHN 
[Drawing back.] 
Not — not a son? 

JONAS 
You have no brother, nor sister, John. 

JOHN 

[Darkly.] 
You lie. 

JONAS 

[Quietly.] 
Have you? 

JOHN 
Your insinuation — that ! You lie in that. 

JONAS 
Do I lie to you, John, — ever? 



THE ANTICK 7j 

JOHN 
\As the truth dawns painfully. 1 
No. 

[The old man looks at him with tenderness, makes an awk- 
ward motion of caress — then refrains. John sinks down 
on the set lie, shaken, hiding his face. His words are 
hardly audible.] 

Canuck! — a Canuck! 

JONAS 

{Looks about helplessly, sees an iron dipper by the trough, 
dips it and hands it to John.] 

Have some water? 

[John motions it away.] 

He built this trough — your father did. 

[Pointing to the words cut in the stone.] 

He made the motto there. 

[Coughing.] 
I 'm thirsty. 

[He drinks from the dipper with deep breaths, then drops it, 
absently, under a bush, gazing at the stanza in the stone.] 

Ha, Lord of V/aysides! To thirst — and mightily: to 
drink — and lustily! 

[Wiping his mouth with his hand.] 
Ha, *t is good! 

[He looks off along the road. 

The fifes and horns have ceased, but a sudden hubbub of 

shouts and the violent ringing of a cow-bell are heard 

close by.] 



72 THE ANTICK 

Creation ! The imps have taken the bell off Doll. 

[He grasps his stick, and starts away.] 

JOHN 

[Getting to his feet.] 

What 's that coining? 

JONAS 

Good omens, John, good omens: angels of the 
Fourth — joy-birds of revolution — gargoyles, gargoyles, 
bless 'em! We've drove 'em from the doors of the 
Lord's house, but the Devil has gathered 'em in his 
highways to dance before him v^ith handsprings, to 
laugh unto the Lord, and stick their tongues out for 
joy. 

[Looking off scene, delightedly.] 

Look at 'em, John, look! They 've nabbed Doll. 
They 're riding the cow, and a goat at her heels ! 

[Shouting, and waving his stick.] 

Independence Day ! God save the Antiques and Hor- 
ribles ! 

JOHN 

[Grimly.] 

The watchdogs of Seventy-six turned to yelping 
jackalls! Ah! 

[He stands still; his voice sounds broken.] 
I — I *m one of them. 

[He sinks down again by the trough.] 
What 's left to me now? 



THE ANTICK 



JONAS 



73 



What's left to ye? Love, and the king's highway! 
"Stick to your own stock" — King of Canucks ! 

[Hailing the crowd outside.] 

Independence, boys and girls! 

[Gesticulating with his tall hat and stick, he goes off. The 
noise outside increases, then subsides. With pressed 
hands, John shuts the sounds from his ears. So for a 
moment he sits, crouched over and still. Then he raises 
his eyes from the settle to the stone lettering on the 
trough, and reads, in a dull tone:] 

Lord of Waysides, life is Thine. 
Turn this water to Thy wine! 
Thirsting brute and man and swine 
All are brothers at Thy shrine. 

[Murmuring.] 

"Man and swine . ." 



God, then, — so be it ! 



[Rising.] 



[He stares in the water. 

The gate in the lilacs opens, and a wry-faced woman, fol- 
lowed by a faded girl, comes down the stone flags to the 
road. The woman is prematurely wrinkled; her tarnished 
red hair is turning gray. She is scrawny, and her clothes 
— crass in color — hang shapeless. When she speaks she 
squints. Just now, she cranes her neck — turkey-like — 
toward the noises down the road. 

The girl, who dogs her with dull placidity, has a pretty, color- 
less face, with regular features. Her lips, however, never 
close, and her eyebrows are permanently raised in mean- 
inzJcss inquiry. Her brownish hair has been painfully 



74 



THE AN TICK 



curled with tasteless art. Whatever youthful charm her 
girlish form may have is hid by her fussy clothes — a 
magenta dress, with yellow spots and infinite tucks. By 
her manner of walking and standing, the dress is evi- 
dently her "best," preserved for Sundays and holidays. 

Mrs. Cassandra White and her daughter Myrtle pause in the 
road, the former listening and peering, the latter sidling 
and picking grass-tops. 

As Mrs. White speaks, John starts at her voice, seizes his 
book and opens it. The movement attracts the girl's 
attention.] 

MRS. WHITE 

Did you ever! — Myrtle, speak up: did you ever! 

MYRTLE 

[Chewing a grass-blade.] 
No, Ma. 

MRS. WHITE 
/ never! 

[Shrilly.] 

'Independence, boys and girls!" Him a minister, 
goin' on seventy! There! he 's joinin' in with 'em. 
There 's two a-ridin' the cow. And I more 'n believe 
old Jonas is forgot to milk her, by her looks. — Ain't 
you watchin'? Drop it! 

MYRTLE 

[Watching John, drops the grass-blade.] 

Yes, Ma. 

MRS. WHITE 

And if there ain't a goat ! What the land 's on the 
back of it : male or female ? 



THE AN TICK 75 

MYRTLE 

{Picking a burr off her skirt.'] 

On the goat? 

MRS. WHITE 

Why, she 's just scand'lous, if she 's woman folks : 
Rigged out in sky-blue jumpers, and a white sugar- 
loaf hat, and red foot-gear — scarlet red! Mebbe she 
ain't a gal, just a long-haired feller, got one o' them 
halfway wigs on. Guess so? 

[Raising her voice.] 
Guess so? 

MYRTLE 

[Carefully disarranging a curl.] 

Guess likely. 

MRS. WHITE 

What be we comin' to next? Live stock at town 
meetin', I presume! These Antiques and Horribles is 
just shameful : spoil my Fourth every season, livin' 
right near the road as we do. 

[Turning, catches sight of John.] 

Well, if there ain't— 

MYRTLE 

[Carelessly.] 

Yes, / seen him before. 

MRS. WHITE 

You seen him! Well, he ain't got eyes for you nor 
L.ie, seems. 



76 THE ANTICK 

[Approaching John toith conscious ceremony and her choicest 
intonation.^ 

Good morning! 

JOHN 

{Starting «/>.] 
Oh! Mrs. — Oh, good morning. 

MRS. WHITE 
Interruptin', be I? 

JOHN 
Not at all ; I was just — How d' do, Myrtle. 

MYRTLE 
{Smirking.l 
How d' do. — I seen you first. 
MRS. WHITE 

Readin' up a speech for town-hall meetin', I s' pose : 
somethin' in the patriotic? 

JOHN 

Why, no; I shan't speak this Fourth. 

MRS. WHITE 

Want t' know! More in the love line, mebbe. 

[Wrinkling a smile, and wagging her head toward Myrtle.'] 

Oh, quite t' be expected ! 

[John is helpless, and looks it.] 

Chores done up for the mornin'? 



THE ANTICK 77 

JOHN 
Yes ; I came this way to see Myrtle— 

MRS. WHITE 
Now, there ! To help fill them lamps ! 

JOHN 
Why, — I was waiting — 

MRS. WHITE 
So was we— for you. Wa'n't we, Myrtle? 

MYRTLE 

Yes, Ma. 

MRS. WHITE 

You by the hoss-trough — us in the house! Don't 
it beat all? 

[John stammers and stops.] 

Mother ailln' 's usual? 

JOHN 

Thanks ; about the same. 

MRS. WHITE 

Yes, would be so. It '11 turn out to be dropsy, cer- 
tain. I tell her, though, she lazes too much: needs a 
right smart girl round the house. Guess she '11 be 
more 'n glad o' mine; won't she. Myrtle? 



MYRTLE 
[Sidling.] 



Ma! 



78 THE ANTICK 

MRS. WHITE 

What / '11 do without her — well, I ain't sayin'. Meb- 
be I '11 stick right by her — and you, John. Nothin' 
just like a mother, let alone bein' a widder. Neither 
one don't al'ays last, but I guess I 'm warranted. 
'Course, when yours doos go — well, come in, come 
right in, and you can help Myrtle fill them lamps. 
There 's one savin' grace in this keepin'-company : if 
it doos spend kerosene, nights, it spares trouble draw- 
in' of it, mornin's. 

JOHN 

[Following her, lugubrious.} 
Kerosene, yes. 

MRS. WHITE 
[Sniggering amiably.] 

Then, too, courtin' wants a quiet corner to sprout, 
and there 's such a racket here in the road. Them 
mis'ble Canucks and mill folks, they 're 'nough to drive 
all decent livers from town. Land, here they come, 
the hull rum hullabaloo! [Shrilly] Come outn that 
dust, Myrtle, with your bran-best stockin's on ! 

MYRTLE 
Ma, sakes! 

[She is hustled by Mrs. White up the flagstone, where they 
wait for John, who follows slozvly, peering toward the 
little crowd, that enters noisily. 

First comes a troop of ragtag youngsters in regimentals, 
headed by a drum-major boy, oificiali.zed by a draggled 
rooster's plume sewed in a rimless sfrazv hat. He beats 
time by twirling in his hand, and tossing in the air, a long 



THE ANTICK 79 

tin horn, between the whirlings of which he toots, 
pirhouettes, and turns handsprings in the dust. His corps 
consists of three fifcrs, a drummer, two clappers of holies 
and a milkpan-bcater, attended by two bobtail bearers 
of the national colors. These pass to the watering place, 
where they stand in a group, and continue to play sundry 
patriotic airs vaguely recognizable as "Yankee Doodle," 
"Dixie," "America," etc. They are followed, strag- 
gling, by a rough, motley gang of young folk, male 
and female, aging from childhood to twenty odd — shout- 
ing, laughing and horn-tooting. These are all dressed in 
masquerade garb of many shapes, colors and inventions. 
The faces of some are painted, or smooched with char- 
coal; others wear masks, false noses and beards. 

In their midst, three figures — that enter toward the end of the 
rabble — are at once conspicuous; the old Minister — tugged, 
coat-tail and sleeve, by small Anticks and Horribles — 
marching, with uncovered head and saluting hat, by the 
side of a goat, astride of which rides a lithe Antick Fig- 
ure, clad in an improvised Pierrot-like costume of bright 
blue, with cone-shaped hat of white paper, and pointed 
boots of scarlet. Wavy black hair, cut round, falls to the 
nape of the blue blouse. The goat, decked — horns and tail 
— with American streamers, marches haltingly, pushed and 
led by grinning attendants. On its head ox-eyed daisies 
make a crown, and about his legs and body — a black and 
yellow harness. 

Reaching the centre of the scene, the beast balks utterly, stand- 
ing with stiff legs planted, while the whole route pauses 
with good-natured jeers, and the drum-corps stops playing. 

At this, the Antick rider, radiant with charming laughter, 
shakes aloft in one hand a cow-bell, and cries aloud, with 
a piquante tinge of French accent:'] 

THE ANTICK 
A drink! A drink for his Majesty! 
{Winking at Jonas."] 
^Ain't it? 



8o run antick 

A HORRIBLE 
Who? — old Stovepipe? 

ANOTHER 
Nixy : the goat ! 

[Shouts of ''Billy, Billy!" "Boose him at the trough!" "He's 

dry," etc. 
By the roadside, John pushes back among the lilac bushes, 

where he stares, half-hidden, at the Antick. Only the 

minister, seeking with a quick glance, catches sight of 

him there. ^ 

JONAS 

[Raising his voice.] 
Boys and girls, hark to your Independence Bell ! 

[Shouts of "Hooray!" "Speech, speech!"] 

[As Jonas speaks, they gather round him, near the trough, 
where numbers of them drink from the basin and the 
log-spout.] 

Friends, Antiques and Horribles ! — 

[Shouts: "Hooray!"] 

Lend me a drinking cup. 

[A Voice: "Borrer your hat!" Jonas raises it in salutation.] 

I hail your suggestion. In this ancient bumper I pro- 
pose you a toast. This is our Glorious Fourth. We 
have gathered to celebrate it. King George the Third 
is dead. His ghost is forgotten. You never heard of 
him. 

[Voices: "Ain't we, though!" "Ah, git out!" "Whafs he 
sayin'f"] 



THE ANTICK 8l 

But King Joy o' the Fourth is alive. His spirit reigns. 
We all acclaim him. 

[Shouts: "Hip, hip!"] 
[The old man directs his voice, but not his eyes, toward the 
lilacs, where John is listening, his eyes unmoved from the 
Antic k.] 
Behold, his shrine is a clear spring by the way; his 
worship is a little pause in the heat ; his pilgrims are 
passers in the dust ; he is the Lord of Waysides, and 
brute and man are his brothers. 

[Voices: "Give's a drink!" "Gee, it's hot!"] 
Here, then, are come now, seeking His shrine, 
like kingfolks of old, these twain, man and 
Ijeast — yea, for woman and man are one in his thirst — 
this Antick and this Goat. Lo, with this wine, I fill now 
a beaker of joy to them both : 

[He dips his tall hat in the trough and raises it, filled with 
water.] 

To Julie, Queen of July, and King William the Con- 
queror ! 
[Shouts of "Hooray!" "Julie!" "King Billy!" "Water 

him!" "Give it to the goat!" 

Jonas — bowing across the brim to Julie — holds the hat with 

both hands under the goat's nose.] 

JULIE 

[Jumping off his back.] 
Let me! I hold it for Billy, King. 
[She takes the hat from Jonas, kisses the goat between the 
eyes, and pats him while he drinks.] 

He is a beaut', my Billy. 



82 THE ANTICK 

A CANUCK FELLOW 

[Putting one arm round her, laughing.] 

She is a beaut', my Julie! 

[Biting his arm, Julie flings the remaining hatful of water 
over him.] 

Ouch— the Devil ! 

[He retreats, to the hoots of the crowd and a mock bow, with 
the hat, fram Julie.] 

JULIE 

The Devil — give him my love where you go to him. 

[She puts the hat on herself — and her own on Jonas — amid 
loud laughter.] 

MRS. WHITE 

[By the gate, to Myrtle.] 

Scand'lous! Don't stand watchin'. Come in! 

MYRTLE 

[Dallying.] 

Where 's John? 

MRS. WHITE 

Oh, he '11 f oiler. Come on — quick! 

[She pushes Myrtle ahead of her through the gate, which 
shuts as they disappear.] 

JONAS 

[To Julie, zvhoni his great hat has swallowed.] 

Liege Lady, hide not such light under so damp'ning 
a bushel! 



THE ANTICK 83 

[He removes the soaked hat, which she still holds with one 

hand.] 

JULIE 

[Coaxing for it with a smile.] 

I like you, old mister. 

JONAS 
[Returning her smile — and his hat.] 
I obey you, young missus. 

A SMALL-BOY ANTICK 
[Nudging her elbow.] 
I '11 frog- jump ye to the trough: will ye? 

JULIE 
[Romping.] 
Me— first frog ! Go it ! 

[They leap-frog each other to the zvater trough.] 
A HORRIBLE 
[Shouting.] 
Say, there ! Your cow 's jumped over the wall. 

JONAS 

[Consternated.] 

Hey-diddle-diddle ! Over the moon would be better. 
In to her mowing, Lord ! The timothy ! the timothy ! 

JULIE 

The grass, is it? Who own the field? 



84 THE ANTICK 

JONAS 

[Forlornly.] 

Cassandra the Curst ! I am a dead man, I shall go 
to heaven chasing that cow. 

JULIE 

[Petting htm.] 

Not you care now. We catch him for you. — Come 
on, boys, girls, catch the damn cow ! 

[Shouts of "Catch her!" ''Over the fence, boys!" etc.] 

THE DRUM MAJOR 

Forward — march ! 

[To drumming, horns and fife-squealing, the whole crowd, 
with unanimous yell, holt oif down the road, hearing the 
Minister with them. In the uproar, Billy the goat stands 
— a rooted derelict — left unregarded hehind. 

As Julie passes the lilacs, John's hand — thrust out — catches 
her sleeve. She glances quickly, stops and stoops down, 
pretending to tie her boot.] 

JONAS 

[Calls from the hubbub.] 

Halloa! — Hurt yourself? 

JULIE 

No, no ! — ^the boot : — never matter. I wait here and 
mind Billy. 

JONAS 

[His eye on the lilacs, waves the white hat.] 

Blessing on the both of ye! 



THE ANTICK 85 

[Hustled by the last of the rabble, he goes out. 

The commotion still continues beyond view. 

Through the picket gate, Mrs. White issues forth to fray, 
like a setting fowl from a coop beset by polecats. Her 
very skirt riMes ivith ire, and her hair with haste. Bran- 
dishing a small kerosene-can, she flurries blindly past Julie 
and the goat, intent, panting, upon the game ahead.] 

MRS. WHITE 

That cow! My timothy-grass! You— you there! 
Skunks! Canucks! Trespassm'! Cows! Timothy! 
Canucks! — nucks! 

[Windbroken, but still cackling, she vanishes beyond the 

maples. 
Outside, gradually, the clamor dies away. 
John comes out from the lilacs, approaches Julie, makes as 

if to speak, but stops, confused. 
Julie does not notice him, but goes to the goat.] 



JuHe! 



JOHN 

[With a gesture of appeal] 



JULIE 
[Fondling the animal] 
Yes, he is nice, pretty boy, my Billy. 
JOHN 

Was that — Pierre? 

JULIE 

And he have nice, pretty boy in the inside : yes ! 

JOHN 

The one — you threw the water on him. 



86 THE ANTICK 

JULIE 

And he never tell no lies, my nice Billy : no ! 
\As she speaks, she hiimr snatches of a song in French*]. 
JOHN 
I saw him : he tried to — Julie ! You bit him, didn't 
you? Is that the fellow? 

JULIE 

[Taking a comb from her blouse, begins to comb the goat's 
beard and flanks.] 

And he stick by his dear Julie, Queen, nights and 
days. And she pet him fine, and make the beard grand 
like the hotel boss, my nice Billy, King. So ! So ! 

JOHN 

You know, I only saw him that once. I thought may 
be — if that was really the one — I — I'm sorry. 

JULIE 

[Humming more merrily, and arranging the ox-eyed daisies.'] 

On the head, he have a crown — for the sun shade. 

JOHN 

I don't mean because you bit. I mean, of course — 
Julie! 

JULIE 

[Tying a big bow-knot in each streamer.] 

On the horn, pretty bow?, one, two — for the flies, 
Billy. 

JOHN 

I mean — myself: what I said that night. I thought 

*[See Note at end of volume. 



THE ANTICK Sy 

you were leaving me for him. But you didn't ! — ^Julie, 
you didn't? Please tell me! 

JULIE 

[Flashing.] 

Ha ! And yet he is sorry ! 

[With a shrug.] 
Wh^t for, Billy? 

JOHN 

Oh, I was fool-jealous, I guess. Of course, in my 
heart, I couldn't really believe you were living with 
him. 

JULIE 

[With a wry face.] 

Bah ! My Billy is more fine gentleman ! 

[Then ingratiatingly to the goat.] 

One little drink — on Julie, yes? 

[With a curtsy.] 

Fine! Pleasure is to me. — At the bar? 

[Shaking her head.] 

Pardon! We serve only in the palm garden. — Yes, 
always the rules in summer. 

[She leads him to the trough.] 

Bordeaux, Monsieur? — No? Chianti? 

[She kisses him on the nose.] 

So! — Little water in the glass? 



88 THE ANTICK 

[The goat drinks.] 
Elegant ! 

[With another curtsy — her hand held slily, as for a pretended 

tip,] 
Merely M'sieiir! 

[Having drunk, the goat is led to the settle.] 

Now — little lunch in the shade, yes ? 

[She ties him where he may nibble a birch bough serenely.] 

Ring, when he want some thing ! 

[She places the cow-bell on the settle, nearby.] 

Always service, night and day. — Yes, Julie Bonheur! 

JOHN 
[Who has watched her, charmed.] 
Ah, yes ! You are different, my Julie ! 

JULIE 
[Feigning to see him for the first time.] 

My, my, myf — Where, Mr. Hale. Where is shef 

JOHN 
Where — who? 

JULIE 

That Julie! My Julie — that's me: yours — I have 
not see her. 

[She turns away.] 

JOHN 
[Cast down.] 
You won't forgive me? 



THE ANTICK Sg 

JULIE 
Forgive? [Shrugging.] That's easy. 
[She extends her hand.] 
JOHN 

[Taking it passionately.] 

Thanks, thanks ! You 're too good. But I'll make 
it up. 

[He tries to take more than the hand. She withdraws the 
hand.] 

JULIE 
You make it up— too much. 

JOHN 
No, I swear. I 'm not fooling any more. I want to 
marry you— truly ! 

JULIE 

On the Independence Day— marry? That is dull. 

JOHN 
Not to-day— very soon. 

JULIE 
Have you not notice — [Smiling.] — them? 
[She shows her wide blue pantaloons, with a flourish.] 
Ha, them is fine! To run in them— to dance — to 
jump ! Ha ! 

[She jumps lightly on the settle, and from the settle upon the 
broad rim of the trough.] 

Once the year I have legs ! 



90 THE ANTICK 

[She throws herself on the green hanking above the trough, 
and sits dangling her scarlet boots.] 

I live in the clover. I am a grasshopper. 

[She chirps the French song again.] 

JOHN 
[Casing up at her.] 
No: you 're a blue hummingbird. 

JULIE 
[Thrusting out her pointed boots at him.] 
Red claws! 

JOHN 

ril catch them in a net yet ! 

JULIE 

[Sticking out her tongue.] 

Sharp bill !— Bites ! 

JOHN 
[Climbing on the rim of the trough.] 

I '11 risk the bites. 

JULIE 
[Tapping her round, bare head, shakes her short hair at him.] 
Little black head — know it all ! 

JOHN 
What made you cut it off? 

JULIE 

This? To make me Pierrot! Long-hair Pierrette 
you not love no more. 



THE ANTICK 



91 



JOHN 

Ah, Julie, Julie dear ! I love you — all my life ! 

JULIE 

Ah, Johnny, Johnny dear! I love you — all last 
week! 

JOHN 

Let me sit by you — please ! 

JULIE 
[Curving her fingers to scratch.] 
No room to lie dov^n. Stand up ! 

JOHN 
You make me want to drown myself. 

JULIE 
The water is fine. Don't mind me. 

JOHN 

Let's make up! 

JULIE 
Sure! 

JOHN 

But you don't give me the chance ! 

JULIE 

But you don't give me the drink ! 

JOHN 
Some water? 

[Looking about.] 
There *s no dipper. 



92 THE ANTICK 

JULIE 

O Billy, Billy, you hear it? No dipper! And he 
say I never give him the chance. 

JOHN 
By Jove ! 

[Letting the water of the logspout run over his hands, he 
hollows them, held together, fills and reaches them to her 
with water.] 

Here 's the dipper. Will this do? — for a chance? 

JULIE 

[Pouting, puts her mouth to his hand-bowl] 
Oh, yes; I think — 
[She touches her lips to the water, and looks up slily.] 
— to begin ! 

[With a delighted cry, he separates his hands to reach her, 
spilling the water. She draws back quickly.] 

Ah, now, the dipper! It is broke. 

JOHN 

I'll find you another one, to-night — in the sky. A 
silver one, that never breaks. We '11 drink out of that 
— together. 

JULIE 
Billy, Billy dear : the boots I He has them all wet ! 

JOHN 
That 's too bad. Come : dry them in the sun. 
[He offers to lift her down.] 



THE ANTICK 93 

JULIE 
[Warning him off.] 
Take care ! You make it worse ! 

JOHN 

[Not to he warned, seises her in his arms.] 

Juliette ! 

JULIE 

[Pulling his hair, escapes and jumps into the trough.] 

So, Mr. Johnny ! 

JOHN 
Great Scott! 

JULIE 

What I tell you : you make it worse ! 
[Kicking the water at him.] 
Keep Vay! 

JOHN 

I won't again. Come out. You mustn't do that. 
JULIE 

Well, somebody got to teach you how you drown 
yourself. That 's easy. Look: First thing, you sit 
down. 

[She looks tentatively at the water.] 

JOHN 

Good Lord, no ! You mustn't. 

JULIE 

[Laughing.] 

No? You think I am scared? 



94 



THE ANTICK 



JOHN 
[In consternation,] 
No, but really — don't! That 's the way to catch 
cold. Please come out. I won't touch you again, I 
swear. 

JULIE 
[Looking at him dubious, as at a naughty child.] 
Swear some more. 

JOHN 
[Very earnest.] 

I promise I won't. 

JULIE 
No, no; swear good! 

JOHN 
Damn it if I will : There I 

JULIE 

[In feigned disappointment.] 

Eh, eh? — You are damn if you will swear good? 

JOHN 
No, ril be damned if I let you catch cold. Come out ! 

JULIE 
[Stepping out on the stone rim.] 
That 's pretty good. 

[She jumps down in the road.] 
JOHN 

In the dust! What are you thinking of? Now 
they're all mud. 



THE ANTICK 95 

JULIE 

[Ruefully, viewing her boots.] 
Ah, Billy, more worse and worse! 

JOHN 
If you had let me — 

JULIE 

[With a gay thought, running to Billy.] 

Never matter, Billy. I tell you : We give them 'way, 
for nice present, Independence Day — 

[She sits on the settle and takes off her boots. She wears 
no stockings.] 

— for surprise the grand ladies ! This one — 

[Here she flings one boot, which strikes the picket gate.] 

— for the Madame. This one — 

[She looks up archly at John.] 

— for the mam'selle! 

[The second boot lands on the flagstones.] 

JOHN 

[Catching her spirit of mischief.] 

You Ve a nice little devil ! — But I love you for that ! 

JULIE 

O Billy, the compliment! I must return him. So! 

[Drying her feet on the goat's flanks.] 

You are nice little — bath-towel. But I love you for 
that! 

[She hugs the goat round the neck.] 



96 THE ANTICK 

JOHN 
[Following suit, after her.] 

Well, Billy, since I have sworn to the girl — ^youVe 
got to be the goat. 

[Caressing the animal, while Julie dries her feet, and turns up 
the bottom of the wet pantaloons.] 

Ah, Billy dear, I love you. You are ten thousand 
years old, and I have loved you — long before I was 
born! I know what you are, King Billy! Just now 
youVe only a pretender. You love me, too, though 
you do mock me with that old, old face of yours. You 
pretend to be just an animal, a village Antick, like the 
others. But I know who owns you, and since I have 
drunk the wine of this wayside — out of the trough, 
Billy — I know that you used to stand on your hind legs, 
on the grass in Arcadia, and play on a water reed, with 
laurels on your horns, and hyacinths on your head — no 
ox-eyed daisies there, Billy — and you and I and an- 
other used to dance to the piping of our great horned 
Master, in the shade, by a wayside of Arcady. 

JULIE 

Yes, yes, to dance — with feet bare ! 

[Skipping about on the grass fringe.] 

Where is that — Arcady? Is it far? 

JOHN 

Not to-day, my kiddie; to-day it's close by. It 's 
over there, where you're skipping; its here, by Billy, 
the god of green things; 



THE ANTICK 97 

[Taking his book from a pocket.] 
and its here — in dreams; 

[Pointing npzvard.] 
and its there in the gold green above us, with the old, 
old sun-god of Greece. 

JULIE 

Ha, Greece : I know that country. Tony, what black 
the boots, he come from there. 

JOHN 

And Julie, that throws the boots; and John, the 
Canuck ! 

JULIE 

[In surprise.] 

John Canuck — I dunno him. 

JOHN 

[Going close to her.] 
Johnny ? 

JULIE 

[Looking in his eyes affectionately.] 

Oh, — Johnny ! — Canuck ? 

JOHN 

[Yearningly.] 

Mustn't I be — what you are? 

JULIE 

[Softening still wore.] 

I like it : Canuck ! 



98 THE ANTICK 

JOHN 
Can't I kiss ? One won't count ! 

JULIE 
Ah, but you swear! — Wait: Can you kiss — Canuck? 

JOHN 
I could learn! 

JULIE 

{Her face towards his.l 

Hands back! Cross behind! 

JOHN 

[Following her action.] 

Hands crossed behind ! 

[Julie smiles at him with ardent tenderness, and nods. 
With hands crossed behind their backs, they lean to each other 

and kiss on the lips. 
Through the gate, Myrtle comes down the flagstones. 
Seeing them, she stops suddenly, and stares. 
Having kissed, Julie sees Myrtle, but John — with his back 

toward Myrtle — sees nothing but Julie, to whom he speaks 

coaxingly.] 

I'm just beginning to learn! 

JULIE 

[Laughing at Myrtle, who gasps.] 

One teacher at the time ! 

[John turns and sees Myrtle, who pretends, in confusion, not 
to have seen them; stoops, and picks up the scarlet boot 
beside her.] 

JOHN 

Good Lord! 



99 



THE ANTICK 

MYRTLE 

[Examining the hoot gingerly, speaks to John.] 

How d'do! Have you dropped something? 

JULIE 

[Covering John's speechlessness.] 

Look like you have drop some thing, Johnny. 

[With a curtsy to Myrtle.] 

The one what the shoe fit — she is the princess. 

MYRTLE 

[Smirking.] 
Oh! 

[Then bridling.] 

You needn't never trouble to fill them lamps, Mister 
Hale! 

[Still retaining the boot, she disappears through the gate. 
Outside, the fifing and drumming begin again.] 

JULIE 

You sure drop some thing hard — that time, Johnny. 

JOHN 

[Breathing deep.] 

Is she gone — really ? 

JULIE 

[Archly pensive.] 

I wonder ! — You know what the priest call the good 
conscience ? 



100 THE ANTICK 

JOHN 

The priest? [Ardently.'] Julie! 

JULIE 

My God, yes! I have the good conscience — that 
time! [With mystery.'] — Fine! Now I tell the bad 
secret. 

JOHN 

Secret? What about? 

JULIE 

[Tapping her breast.] 

Julie Bonheur ! Ssh ! She have a sister, what marry 
a Canuck, what his name is — Ssh! 

JOHN 
What? 

JULIE 

[Darkly.] 
Is — Pierre ! 

JOHN 

He ! — The fellow that I — your sister's husband ! 
JULIE 

Abominable ! Julie live in the house of her brother- 
in-law ! 

[She bursts into laughter.] 

JOHN 

And I imagined — Bah ! Don't torment me. 

[Untying the goat.] 
Come, Billy. 

[To Julie.] 

Quick : let 's go to the priest. 



THE ANTICK lOl 

JULIE 

What for — the priest ? 

JOHN 

[Points to the gate.] 

She may come back. Let 's get married. 

JULIE 

[Appalled.] 

Us— the banns! Have you not kiss me— Canuck? 

JOHN 

[Pu22led.] 

Why, yes, I forgot: but is that—? 

JULIE 

[With coming tears.] 

Billy, you see it: so soon he forgot! And he talk 

of the banns ! 

JOHN 

Julie, you know I love you always — forever ! 

JULIE 

[Outraged.] 

Billy, you hear it? These Yankees they say only 

that: / love you always, forever! Why not they say: 
/ love you — all this week!? 

JOHN 

[With emotion.] 

Don't call me that : Yankee. 

JULIE 

[Dismissing the gathered storm with a smile.] 



I02 THE ANTICK 

All right : you call me Yankee, I call you Canuck. 
[Imitating his voice and struggling with her accent.^ 
John, I love you always — forever! 

JOHN 
Amen ! 

JULIE 

{Laughing affectionately in his face.] 

Bah ! Old John Amen ! 

JOHN 

Now, quick ! The whole gang 's coming back. Get 
on Billy, and we'll go get married. 

JULIE 
Go on Billy — sure! Go marry — nix! 

JOHN 
Nonsense! You know better. 

JULIE 

How can I know better before I try? How can I 
try, before I know better? 

[Imitating him.] 
— Nonsense ! 

JOHN 

Don't we love each other ? 

JULIE 

On the Independence Day — 

[Patting liim lovingly like the goat."] 



THE ANTICK 103 

— Ha, he is Johnny ! On the Christmas Day ? — Ayho ! 
Perhaps he be John! 

JOHN 
[Half angry,"] 
Don't talk like that. 

JULIE 
[Stroking his head.] 

No, sure! We stop talking. We stick to the job, 
and talk about the strikes — next Christmas. 

[Laughing.] 
May be I pay you good wages ! 

JOHN 
[Gasping.] 
And aren't we ever to be married ? 

JULIE 

[Shrugging.] 

The new moon grow in the night ! When Billy dear 
he have the kiddies, he stay at home, tied up. Stop the 
talking. Here they come all with the cow. Get on ! 

JOHN 

[In response to her gesture.] 

On Billy? 

JULIE 

What — ^you call him? — ^god of the green things! 

JOHN 

[Mounting behind her.] 

All right, my Julie: We '11 keep green! 



104 



THE ANTICK 



[The clamor of the Horribles outside hursts louder. 
Preceding them, at shouting distance, with head craned back^ 

ward, Mrs. White enters, perspiring. 
Straddling the goat — John touching his feet alternately to the 

ground — the two lovers move toward her,] 

MRS. WHITE 

[Shouting back.] 

Yes, Minister Boutwell, you just shet tHe beast in 
your own barn, and pray by her : hundred dollars wuth, 
Jonas! Timothy 's high feedin' for cows! 

[Turning, she confronts the beridden goat.] 

Well, if here aint the Antique : male and female I — My 
God, him — ^John! 

JOHN 

[Politely.] 

Did you catch the cow, Mrs. White? 

MRS. WHITE 
[Staring aghast, bolts past the goat for the gate.] 
No, land ! It aint human ! 

JULIE 

[Calls after her,] 

Please! — We drop some thing. 

[Mrs. White, who has reached the other red boot, pauses and 
looks from that to the couple. Julie nods graciously.] 

Yes, thank you. 

[Mrs. White picks it up.] 

Please, will Madame throw it after us — ^tlie old shoe ! 



THE ANTICK 105 

[She bursts into merry peals, answered by hilarious laughter 
from the rabble outside, whose entrance with fife and 
drum is imminent.] 

MRS. WHITE 

Well, if that don't beat the Lord !— 

[Flinging the shoe at them.] 

And good riddance! 

[Standing in the rood, she glozvcrs toward the arch of the 

maples, zvhcre John and Julie, urging fonvard the be- 

straddled goat, are greeted by the joyous cheers of the 
Anticks and Horribles.] 



CURTAIN, 



THE CAT-BOAT 

A Fantasy for Music 



CHARACTERS 



NICO. 

HIS MOTHER. 
A SKIPPER. 
NEREIDA. 



TIME: To-day. 

PLACE: MU Desert, Maine? 



THE CAT-BOAT* 

The scene is a small work-shop. Occupying the larger part of 
it, stands a partly completed sail-boat, jacked up on wood- 
en horses. An old spar, placed in it tentatively as a mast, 
is wedged at the top against the ceiling — evidently a tem- 
porary makeshift, as a proportionate mast would tower 
four times the height of the room. The floor of the room 
is littered with ends of boards and beams. Sawdust and 
shavings are piled high about the boat's keel. On its bow 
the word "NEREIDA" has been blocked in, with green 
lettering. 

Along the left wall, a work-bench in confusion. Jumbled 
among the tools are several books, in one of which a 
chisel is laid, to keep the open page. At back, left, a 
large door; at back, centre, a small-paned window, half- 
open. Through these are glimpses of a sea-scape toward 
sunset: fishing-skiffs aground on a loiv-tide beach. 

On the near side of the boat, Nico — a robust, Portuguese type 
of boy in his teens — is stretched along the deck. His face 
is partly hidden in his bent right-arm and deep-black locks; 
his left arm hangs over the boat's side, swinging from the 
half-relaxed hand a hammer, with slow, pendulum motion. 

Faintly, yet with a sense of nearness, rises the singing of a 
girl's voice. 



•Copyright, 191 2, by Percy MacKaye. All rights reserved. 

109 



no THE CAT-BOAT 

THE VOICE 

I lay in the heart of a wave 

In the burning west ; 
The Lord of Evening flamed 

His royalest ; 
And gorgeous mists went by 

Like guest on guest 
Over a palace floor, 

All richly dresst. 

[Nico rises and leans on his right arm, staring upon the 
shavings.] 

Out of the crimson came 

A ship of gray; 
I watched her silver prow 

Flash far away; 
She flew like a shining hawk 

That seeks her prey, 
And round her bosom sprang 

The dazzling spray. 

[In the doorzvay appears the Skipper. Nico relaxes again 
to his first attitude, recommencing the pendulum motion 
of the hammer.] 

Amid her sails I saw 

The pied mists hover, 
Like butterflies that float 

Among white clover, 
And a fair boy his arm 

Was dangling over ; 
I seized his hand and kissed 

And called him lover ! 



THE CAT-BOAT m 

[The Skipper, carrying a bucket, comes into the shop, pauses, 
eyes the oblivious boy, adjusts a plug of tobacco, and 
spits. Nico leaps to his feet and stands upright on the 
deck.] 

THE SKIPPER 
'Ev'nin', Nick. 

[Half frightened, half fascinated, the boy gases at the Skip- 
per, as if trying to focus his wits on an apparition.] 

'Sleep again? 

[Nico, still half fearful, begins to hammer rapidly.] 

'Sleep again, I asked ye? 

NICO 
No, Cap'n. 

THE SKIPPER 
Oh! 

[Setting down his bucket, he draws out a stool and prepares a 
plug of tobacco.] 

Hammered that same peg twenty-'leven, times, ain't 
ye? — Bust it, won't ye? 

NICO 
I beg pardon. 

THE SKIPPER 
Oh! 

[Nico recommences feverishly.] 

Quit, can ye? 

[Tapping his forehead.] 

I've got some idees on to boil, and I want quiet to cook 
'em. 

[Picking up the open-book from the zvork-bench.] 
Principles of navigation? 



112 THE CAT-BOAT 

NICO 

[Trying to secure it courteously hut with Jiaste.] 

It 's mine. 

THE SKIPPER 

Hold on. [Reads.]— "ThQ Odyssey." Hm! What 
truck's that ? — Up-to-date ? 

NICO 

[Having secured it.] 
I think so. 

[He secretes it tinder some shavings.] 

THE SKIPPER 

[Points to his bucket.] 

See them? 

NICO 

Blue fish. Fine ones ! 

THE SKIPPER 
How long since you catched some? 

NICO 
I don't know, Cap'n. Six weeks, I guess. 

THE SKIPPER 
Six months, damn it! — Them's for your mother. 

NICO 

[Brightening.] 
For mother ! 

THE SKIPPER 
I seen her scrapin' round at low-tide for clams. All 



THE CAT-BOAT 



113 



she got was barnacles. I seen her cook 'em; yes, sir, 
and eat on 'em. You're a pretty brat — you ! 

NICO 

She'll be glad of these. You're very kind. 

THE SKIPPER 

Oh, I'm a philanthropist — me ! That's the fifth mess 
I've catched for her in a fortnight. I fished 'em into 
my boat, the Betsy. Say! How's trade with you, 
Nicky? How many saw^-dust herrin' have ye hauled 
into your beauty here — what ye call her? 

NICO 
[Lozv.'\ 
Nereida. 

THE SKIPPER 

One of your dad's fancy-article names, what? He 
were a school-master in Massachusetts, what? 

NICO 
Yes, Cap*n. 

THE SKIPPER 

[Mutters, reminiscent.] 

Come up here to Mt. Desert for the holidays and fell 
to courtin' a Portugee girl. Married her, too, took to 
fishin' and got drowned. Folks say you take after him, 
what ? 

NICO 
They say so. , 

THE SKIPPER 

Then why in God's fish-hook don't ye clear away off 



114 ^^^ CAT-BOAT 

down to Massachusetts and take to the school-mister 
business like him ? Why don't ye quit this makin'-out 
ye're a shipwright, and support your poor, old ailin' 
mother, what ain't even got food and gear for herself, 
by God! 

NICO 
[Ardently.] 

My mother shall have all her heart desires. I 've 
promised her. You shall see, Cap'n; you shall see, 
when I finish Nereida. 

THE SKIPPER 

When ye finish Nereida ! That's prime. Did ye ever 
finish anythin' yet ye started out to ? 

[Points to the hoat."] 

Look at her there. She were begun a year ago ; three 
months ago she were precisely the same stage o' growth 
as she sets there now. What ye got that stick stuck 
up for a mast for? 

NICO 

[Embarrassed.] 

That's only — that's just to sail her with, sometimes. 

THE SKIPPER 

Sail her, eh? Where away? Into the fireplace and 
up the chimney ? And what ye keep your shop messed 
up with these here shavin's and truck for ? 

NICO 
[Reservedly.] 
The shavings — you don't understand, Cap'n. 



THE CAT-BOAT 115 

THE SKIPPER 

Oh, I don't, mebbe. Wall, I understand this, young 
man : you play ! You play like a kid when y' ought to 
be workin' like a man. How darest ye raise the cheek 
to build ye a sailin' boat anyhow ? 

NICO 

I 've watched the boats sail, always. 

THE SKIPPER 

See-a-boat sails a boat. Lookin' 's doin\ That your 
point ? 

NICO 

I Ve longed always to build one myself. 

THE SKIPPER 

Long-for-a-cat-boat builds ye a cat-boat; long- 
for-the-White-House gets ye the White House; long- 
for-the-fuU-moon gets ye the full moon! — That your 
point ? 

NICO 

[Puszled.l 

Perhaps you don't understand, Cap'n. When the 
breeze is stiff, a sail-boat is wonderful. She's like an 
aquatic bird : the green water bubbles round her breast ; 
then she's just about to dive. The blue sky spreads 
under her wings ; then she's just going to fly. 



THE SKIPPER 
[Peering, keenly.] 



But doos she? 



lie THE CAT-BOAT 

NICO 

[Oblivious.] 

Then she rounds a rocky headland ; you can't see her 
sHm body for the hemlocks; but right against the 
mountains you see her bright stretched wings floating 
inland silently to her nest. 

THE SKIPPER 
[Scratching his chin.] 
Why, Nick, my lad, then that settles me in my mind. 
I ain't much ; you beat me ; I own up : there's more fish 
in the sea than ever I catched, and that's all. But jest 
one thing; jest one thing, I ask ye, my lad. — You love 
your mother? 

NICO 

You know it — how much. 

THE SKIPPER 
Do I ? P'raps mebbe. 

NICO 
[Simply,} 
I would die for her. 

THE SKIPPER 

Jest this, then: if ye love your mother, finish that 
boat; don*t let your Ma die, but finish that boat; and 
when you've got her done — I'll pay ye two hundred dol- 
lars for her. 

NICO 

Cap'n ! Two hundred dollars ! 



THE CAT-BOAT iiy 

[Seising the Skipper's hand, lie kisses it.] 
— Cap'n ! 

THE SKIPPER 

[Drawing his hand away.] 

Say, come! — You promise to finish her? 

NICO 

I promise ! I can do it easily by this day week. O 
Mammy ! dear, poor Mammy ! You'll be a queen then ! 

THE SKIPPER 

Gettin' late; better come along and fetch them fish 
home t' her. 

NICO 

No, no! You take them; please! I'm going to get 
right to work. I'll come later. 

THE SKIPPER 

Wall! — Good night. 

[Takes up the bucket.] 
By the by, — finish that boat! 

[He goes out.] 
NICO 
[Calls after him.] 
I've promised, Cap'n. Tell Mammy to come and see 
me at work. 

[Joyously.] 

Tw^o hundred dollars ! 

[Seizing up his hammer, he springs to the boat and strikes a 
single blow. A chorus of girlish voices fills the room. 



Ii8 THE CAT-BOAT 

Nico pauses an instant, then pounds faster, striving to 
drown them. Finally, as they sing on, he drops his ham- 
mer, and holds his hands over his ears.] 

THE VOICES 

Follow up ! follow up ! — follow after ! 

To the shores that are sweet with our laughter, 

Where the silvery petrel claps his wings 

And the cliffs are hoarse with our hallooings. 

NICO 

God! 

THE VOICES 

Follow on ! follow on ! — follow fleeter ! 
To the reefs where our chorus grows sweeter, 
Where we chase and race our white-maned fillies 
That trample the blue-green ocean-lilies. 

NICO 

[Crying out.] 
Stop! 

THE VOICES 

Follow down! follow down! — follow faster! 
To the beautiful deeps of disaster, 
Where we clash and dash our foaming chalices 
In the roaring courts of our silent palaces. 

NICO 

1 will not hear! 

[Passionately he recommences his hammering and, to drown 
their song, sings to the cadence of his blozvs.] 



THE CAT-BOAT 

Who shall be served? — The Lord He said! — 
From Kennebunkport to Cahfornee? 

Who gave me birth? Who gives me bread? 
Hep! March! 
Tis my own Countree. 

NEREIDA'S VOICE 
[As in pain.] 
Nico ! — Nico ! 

NICO 
[Hammers and sings.] 
Proudly her liegemen sons she led 

From Kennebunkport to Calif ornee, 
And freedom sang above the tread 
Hep! March! 
Of my own Countree. 

NEREIDA'S VOICE 
Nico, pity ! You bruise my side. 
NICO 
[Hammers and sings.] 
She has set her stars to watch her dead 
From Kennebunkport to Calif ornee: 
For she 's sung 'em to sleep with the singing lead, 
Hep! March! 
Has my own Countree. 

NEREIDA'S VOICE 
You wound my breast. 

NICO 
[Hammers and sings.] 



119 



120 THE CAT-BOAT 

Good-bye to weanling! Good-bye to wed! 

From Kennebunkport to Calif ornee: 
I am gone with the rest for to make my bed 
Hep! March! 
With my own Countree. 

NEREIDA'S VOICE 
You break my heart. 

NICO 
[Ceasing.l 
Nereida ! Nereida ! 

NEREIDA'S VOICE 

[Still as in pain.] 
No more! 

NICO 

What have I done ? Forgive me ! 

NEREIDA'S VOICE 
Nico! 

NICO 

[Laying his head against the prow of the boat.] 

Come to me! 

NEREIDA'S VOICE 

Are you true? 

NICO 
Come to me ! 

NEREIDA'S VOICE 
Will you not beat my bosom with your steel ? 



THE CAT-BOAT 121 

NICO 

{Flinging his hammer to the farthest corner of the shop.\ 
Come to me! 

NEREIDA'S VOICE 
Fine, Nico! 

[From the prow of the boat, where the shavings are piled 
highest, Nereida emerges — head and shoulders and breast 
above the deck, where a shaft of the sunset through the 
window falls upon her. Like the golden, curling shavings 
are the long ringlets of her hair, and through the sweet- 
scented pile about her shoulders she reaches her arms to 
Nico.] 

NICO 
At last! 

[He embraces her, and playfully she half smothers his face 
in the shavings.] 

NEREIDA 

Cruel Nico! feel here at my side where your cold 
hammer bruised me. Kiss here my throat, where the 
hard steel wounded. Are not you ashamed, naughty 
Nico ? 

NICO 

[Kissing her.] 

I am happy and sad. Let me forget. 

NEREIDA 

Is it not enough that you have my soul ? Must you 
make for me a shell to creep into, to pine in and be 
tossed in — a toy for my own mermaids — till at last, 
flung upon the storm beach, I scorch and wither there ? 



122 THE CAT-BOAT 

NICO 

Let me forget, Nereida. 

NEREIDA 

And when you have nailed me fast in my sea-sarco- 
phagus, will you paint neatly on my tomb NEREIDA — 

[Points to the lettering.'] 

like that — and praise me among the skippers in the 
dockyard, and say: **Look at her there! Isn't she 
perfect? Show me a cutter or brig like Nereida! " 

NICO 

, Your hammer is harder than mine. Spare me ! 

NEREIDA 

What, my Nico! Did you spare me? This work 
of your hammer and saw — what will it avail you when 
all is shipshape and perfect? Will it be I? 

NICO 
^ No, no! 

NEREIDA 

What, then, am I to you, Nico ? 
NICO 

Nereida, you are all — all that the heart in my ham- 
mer yearns toward. 

NEREIDA 

All rather that your thick-headed hammer would 
destroy! I am your full-rigged frigate under sail, 
your wide-winged racer flying, your sloop moored in 



THE CAT -BO AT 12^ 

the moonlight, your skiff, skimming the breezy silver 
of the dawn. I am the awful flashing of your thousand 
triremes, and I am the white-winged peace of all your 
argosies. Yet you — O Nico! O excellent master 
architect ! What thing is this which your art has label- 
led Nereida? What ultimate fulfilment of our love? 
— A skipper's cat-boat, for sale for two hundred dol- 
lars! 

NICO 

No, no ! I will build you the triremes, the argosies — 
a thousand fleets. Only first I will complete — just a 
cat-boat. 

NEREIDA 

Completed What would you complete? — The stars? 
The dance of the worlds? The song of the angels? 
What would you complete, my Nico? — A coffin for 
your beloved ? 

NICO 

[Pained.] 

Nereida ! But I have promised ! 

[With a cry, Nereida disappears within the prow.] 

Nereida, come back ! 

[In desperation, Nico grasps vainly among the shavings, 
kisses the wood, touches the boat caressingly.] 

Come back, Nereida! Only hear me. She Is old — 
dear, poor Mammy ! She is ill ; she starves. She has 
none but me: I have given the Skipper my word. If I 
break it, she will die. Only hear me, Nereida ! She is 
old ; she is ill ; she will die ! 



124 THE CAT-BOAT 

NEREIDA'S VOICE 
[Sings.] 

Behind the larch my sail is set 

By the dusk-green cedar's pile. 
Where the brine is on the violet, 
And the balsam's dipping bough is wet 
By the long and the blue and the bright inlet 

That clasps the heart of the isle. 

NICO 

{Sinking down.] 
She is old ; she is ill ; she will die ! 

NEREIDA'S VOICE 
[Sings.] 

Lay your head in the lap of me 

And good-bye to the shore ! 
Leave laurel and lark and swarded lea, 
Leave homing swallow and hiving bee, 
And lie with me and the infinite sea, 

Forever and evermore ! 

NICO 

Nereida, come back! I will never lift my hammer 
again ! 

NEREIDA 

[Her wan-bright locks rising through a pile of loose shavings 
in the sun's slant beam.] 

Swear it, Nico! 



THE CAT-BOAT 125 

NICO 

[Springing towards her.] 

I swear it! 

NEREIDA 

[Disappears from the shavings and rises again, waist-high, 
from the boat — this time beside the rudder.] 

Fine Nico! Kiss me and forget! 

NICO 
Nereida ! 

[Passionately he goes to her and kisses her; then leaps joyously 
upon the deck, runs to the edge and winds an imaginary 
cable.] 

Heave anchor ! Off shore ! Let her free ! 

NEREIDA 

The wind 's sou'west ; pile the white-caps, Nico. 

NICO 

[Springs dozvn, gathers up armfuls of shavings and sawdust 
and heaps them higher about the bow of the boat.] 

Loose the port halyards, Nereida. Let the boom 
swing. 

NEREIDA 

[As she loosens invisible ropes.] 

Pile higher. 

NICO 

[Running with a fresh armful.] 
How's this for a sea ! 



126 THE CAT-BOAT 

NEREID A 
Aboard ! aboard ! She's off. 

NICO 

[Bounds upon the deck.] 

Hurrah! She leaps like a colt with foam on her 
bit. Aha ! feel her flanks tingle ; it's her racing blood ! 
— Port ! port ! taut her mains'l. 

NEREIDA 

Look away to the sky-line, Nico ! — The wide, bright 
world ! 

NICO 

[In the prow.] 

White and blue, white and blue, on and forever! 
Watch how her bowsprit dips and the big wave boils 
round her. Haha! did you catch that spray in the 
eyes ? I '11 be Columbus, Nereida ; and you shall be the 
crew and mutiny. — Or why not Magellan? To circle 
first around our star. Or Darwin ? To watch the man- 
beasts crawl on Tierra del Fuegos. Or Perry off 
Japan ! At sunrise, to see the bronze diver fetch up his 
pearl to the foam, in the blue shadow of Fujiyama ! Or 
some old Phoenecian captain, creeping — aghast and 
alone — westward between the pillars of Hercules! 
Which of all shall we be, Nereida? We are free: Say 
— where shall we steer? 

NEREIDA 

[Lifting the book from the shavings, where Nico concealed 
it from the Skipper.] 

Shall I choose? 



THE CAT-BOAT 127 

NICO 
Choose, you ! 

NEREIDA 

Take me home, then, Nico : mine is the olden time. 
[Handing him the book.] 

Here is our chart-book; by this we will steer. Look 
away there to starboard ! — 

The reef and the breakers: beyond them the long 
blue hill slopes inland upward into the isle of Aea. 

NICO 

[Sinks dozvn, laying the book on the deck and covering his 
face with his hands.] 

The isle of Circe ! 

NEREIDA 

Hark ! Do you hear them, Odysseus ? The roar of 
the waves is loud, but their voices are heard in your 
heart. Are they wolves? Are they swine? Hark 
again ! 

NICO 

My men ! my men !— Their hoofs are tearing the turf 
by the palace-door ; their snouts are nozzling the pop- 
pies by the fountain. Let me up from our couch, let 
me go to them — Circe ! enchantress ! 

NEREIDA 

[Drawing him close with one arm, with the hand of the other 
places upon his hair a garland, which she has been twisting 
of the shavings.] 

My lord and hero dreams — See ! I have woven him 
a chaplet of the poppies. 



128 THE CAT-BOAT 

NICO 
{Lying beside Nercida on the deck — the hook near them.] 

Kiss me again ! 

NEREIDA 

[Ever visible only to the waist, bends sinuously forward 
along the boat's side, and letting her long locks fall 
among the waves of the shavings, scoops up a hand- 
ful of sawdust, which through her tzvo small fists 
she lets glide, backward and forward, as through an 
hour-glass.] 

Look, dreamer of gods! These are the golden 
sands of Circe's isle. Behold how swiftly they mete 
the life-time of dreams ! 

NICO 
How beautiful — the sands of Circe's isle! 

NEREIDA 
And feel — how heavy. 

NICO 
Gold — solid gold ! 

NEREIDA 

[Letting fall the last.] 

And glisten so fine. — Ah ! my hero, love me longer. 
The sands are black in Ithaca, your home. 

NICO 
Home ! — home ! 

NEREIDA 

The seas are terrible between Ithaca and here. 



THE CAT-BOAT I29 

NICO 

Goodbye — for home. She is waiting — she prays for 
me! 

NEREIDA 

Beyond my isle Hes destruction ; the shadows of hell 
are there. Scylla devours her living and Charybdis 
sucks down her dead. Do not leave me, my hero ! 

NICO 

Heave off ! my men. Set her sails. 

NEREIDA 

The Sirens sing their song from the meadow of 
skulls and flowers. The crew's ears must be stopped 
with wax; if they hear, they are lost. But you I 
will lash in the masthead, and you shall listen. 

[Where he stands against the mast, she begins to tie him to 
it with strands of the shavings, which she tzuists and 
knots together. He helps her.] 

NICO 

The Sirens' voices— are they as sweet as yours? 

NEREIDA 
Even as mine. 

NICO 
O bind me, then, with the chains of Prometheus. 

NEREIDA 

These thongs are mightier than his. So!— now you 
are bound. Set sail ! Scylla and Charybdis are loom- 
ing ahead. Farewell, my Odysseus ! 



130 THE CAT-BOAT 

NICO 
Circe, farewell! 

NEREIDA 
Farewell ! 

[Sliding amid the shavings where they are piled highest, she 
glides overboard and is gone. The work-shop has become 
twilit; Nice stands tied to the mast, motionless, ex- 
cept for his head, which turns, or is thrust forward, lis- 
tening, as his eyes seem to descry the things of his 
imagination.] 

NICO 

Where are we drifting, my men? The night comes 
down. 

Where are we drifting? Their ears are filled with 
wax : they cannot hear. 

[Out of the dusk comes a music of rushing zvaters, and 
female voices are heard singing :\ 

THE VOICES 

Stay! stay! 

Stay thy wing'd barque, 
King of Achaeans! 
Hark — hark 
The Sirens' story 
Of heroes castaway: 
The Argives' glory, 
Their victories and paeans ! 

NICO 
I hear you, Sirens. 

THE VOICES 

Troy-land ! Troy-land I 
Her orient halls ! 



THE CAT-BOAT I31 

Troy-land ! Troy-land ! 

Her cloud-capp'd, kindling walls ! 
NICO 
The roaring waters hear you. Sing on ! 

THE VOICES 

Who guessed the might of them, 

The gladness, the glow? 
Drunk at the sight of them. 

Who dreamed of the woe? 

NICO 
Ah, me! 

THE VOICES 

Not they, the Achaeans ! 

Hearken their paeans: 

Sisters, we know! 

Sing them again — 

The songs of the silent dead men — 

Sing them low. 

NICO 
Sing always! 

THE VOICES 

Odysseus ! 

Come hither and rest. 

NICO 
I am coming! 

THE VOICES 

Odysseus ! 

Thou only shalt hear: 



132 THE CAT-BOAT 

NICO 
I am yours ! 

THE VOICES 

The beauty, the joy and the martyrdom. 

The knowledge, the fear. 

And the woe that were and will come — 

To thee alone 

Shall be known. 

NICO 

Let me free ! Loose me, my men ! 

THE VOICES 

To the dreadful, the dear, 

O draw near ! 

Our breasts to thy breast 

And the heart of the god beating under ! 

From our lips the rest — 

Troy-land ! Troy-land ! 

And all the wonder ! 

[In the doorumy appears an old and haggard Woman, ill- 
clad and feeble. She carries a ligJited lantern, and peers 
in.] 

NICO 

[Struggling.] 

Loose me! — They do not hear. — Let me free! Let 
me free ! — Dear goddess of Love, let me free ! 

THE OLD WOMAN 

[Feebly hastens toward him.] 

Nice! Little Nico! what ails ye? 



THE CAT-BOAT I33 

NICO 

At last ! She 's come ! — Let me free ! 

THE OLD WOMAN 

[Climbing from a stool upon the hoat.\ 

My boy, what 's happed ye? Who's tied ye here? 

{Loosens him.] 

Why, it's only shavin's that bind ye! 

[Retreating before his passionate gesture, to the floor.] 

Stop ! stop, Nico ! Wliy do ye stare so ? Stand away, 
boy! Don't ye know me? 

NICO 

[Following her wildly with outstretched arms, falls at her 
feet and embraces her knees.] 

You are the Queen of the Sirens ! I love you ! 

THE OLD WOMAN 
Nico! Don't ye know your own Mammy? 

NICO 

[Springing to his feet, staggers back, staring, then seizing up 
the lantern, brings it close to the old woman's face, 
scanning it terribly,] 

Mother ! 

[He drops the lantern, which goes out, leaving the shop in 
vague twilight.] 

No, no ! She 's false ! She has betrayed me. 

[Flinging himself beside the boat.] 

Nereida! Come back to me, Nereida! * 



134 THE CAT-BOAT 

THE OLD WOMAN 

Little Nico! 

{She gropes toward him.] 

NICO 

She 's gone; she 's false. Nereida! Come to me, 
Nereida ! 

THE OLD WOMAN 

[Appalled.] 

What's that in your hand? Stop! What '11 ye 
do ? How will we live, boy, if ye do it ? 

NICO 

Nereida! for the last time, answer me! Come back 
to me! 

THE OLD WOMAN 

Put it down, Nico! 

[Kneeling.] 

God, take the axe from him and save us ! 

NICO 

She doesn't answer. See then, Nereida! I am 
coming to you. I will find you and make you mine. 

[There resounds the crash of a falling mast; and the dimly- 
seen form of Nico, heavily swinging an axe, is heard 
hacking and smashing the hull of the ship to pieces.] 

Are you here? Are you hiding deeper? 

THE OLD WOMAN 

[Still kneeling.] 

Lord, save little Nico! 



THE CAT -BO AT I35 

NICO 

{Calling amid his blows."] 

Nereida! Nereida! Nereida! Nereida! 

[Among the heaped litter of broken boards, shavings and 
sawdust, he sinks down exhausted. As the old woman 
is trying tremulously to re-light the lantern, the head and 
bust of Nereida rise through a pile of sawdust beside 
NicOj irradiated by a dim rainbow-light from below.J 

NEREIDA 

Did you call me, Nico? Don't you know me? 

NICO 

[Faintly, trying to rise,] 

Beautiful and terrible, what are you? 

NEREIDA 

I am the naiad of the uncompleted — the Circe of 
dreams. I am the beauty of wreck, the aurora of 
despair. You will build again and again, and I will 
come and abide in your masterwork, till the 
work shall crumble. You will love me and hate me 
again, but you shall not elude me. Till by and by, 
Nico mine, in the endless rebuilding of life, you shall 
take me to your heart and love me, and make me your 
mistress forever. 

NICO 

[Reaching to embrace her.} 

My beloved! 

[She sinks into the sawdust and disappears.'] 



136 THE CAT-^BOAT 

THE OLD WOMAN 

[Comes wistfully over to him with the lantern.] 

What's that ye're starin' on, little Nico? What's 
that ye're takin' to your heart? 

NICO 

[Groping with his arms amid the pile, then strewing it ovef 
his bowed head and shoulders.] 

Sawdust, Mammy ! — sawdust ! 



'CURTAIN. 



SAM AVERAGE 
A Silhouette 



CHARACTERS 



ANDREW. 

JOEL. 

ELLEN. 

SAM AVERAGE. 



An intrenchment in Canada, near Niagara Falls, in the year 
1814. Night, shortly before dawn. 



SAM AVERAGE* 

On the right, the dull glow of a smouldering wood- fire 
ruddies the earthen embankment, the low-stretched outline 
of which forms, with darkness, the scenic background. 

Near the centre, left, against the dark, a flag with stars floats 
from its standard. 

Besidei the fire, Andrew, reclined, gases at a small frame in 
his hand; near him is a knapsack, with contents emptied 
beside it. 

On the embankment, Joel, with a gun, paces back and forth, 
a blanket thrown about his shoulders. 



. JOEt 

[With a singing call.] 
Four o'clock! — All 's well! 
[Jumping down from the embankment, he approaches the fire.] 
ANDREW 
By God, Joel, it 's bitter. 
JOEL 
[Rubbing his hands over the coals.] 
A mite sharpish. 

♦Copyright, 1912, by Percy MacKaye. All rights reserved. 

139 



140 SAM AVERAGE 

ANDREW 

[Looks up eagerly.] 
What? 

JOEL 

Cuts sharp, for Thanksgivin'. 

ANDREW 

[Sinks back, gloomily.] 
Oh! 

[A Pause.] 

1 wondered you should agree with me. You meant 
the weather. I meant — 

[A pause again.] 

JOEL 
Well, Andy: what 'd you mean? 





ANDREW 


Life. 




Shucks ! 


JOEL 




AiNDREW 




[To himself.] 



Living ! 

JOEL 

[Sauntering over left, listens.] 
Hear a rooster crow? 



SAM AVERAGE 141 

ANDREW 
No. What are you doing? 

JOEL 

Tiltin' the flag over crooked in the dirt. That 's our 
signal. 

ANDREW 

Nothing could be more appropriate, unless we bur- 
ied it — buried it in the dirt ! 

JOEL 

She 's to find us where the flag 's turned down. I 
fixed that with the sergeant all right. The rooster 
crowin' 's her watch-word for us. 

ANDREW 

An eagle screaming, Joel: that would have been 
better. [ Rising. ] — Ah ! 

[He laughs painfully.] 

JOEL 

Hush up, Andy! The nearest men ain't two rods 
away. You '11 wake 'em. Pitch it low. 

ANDREW 
Don't be alarmed. I 'm coward enough. 



142 SAM AVERAGE 

JOEL 

'Course, though, there ain't much danger. I 'm sen- 
tinel this end, and the sergeant has the tip at t'other. 
Besides, you may call it the reg'lar thing. There 's 
been two thousand deserters already in this tuppenny- 
ha'penny war, and none on 'em the worse off. When 
a man don't get his pay for nine months — well, he ups 
and takes his vacation: why not? When Nell joins 
us, we '11 hike up the Niagara, cross over to Tona- 
wanda and take our breakfast in Buffalo. By that 
time, the boys here will be marchin' away toward 
Lundy's Lane. 

ANDREW 

[Walks back and forth, shivering.] 
I 'm afraid. 

JOEL 
'Fraid? Bosh! 

ANDREW 
I 'm afraid to face — 

JOEL 
Face what? — We won't get caught. 

ANDREW 
Your sister — my wife. 

JOEL 
Nell! — Why, ain't she comin' here just a-purpose 



SAM AVERAGE 143 

to get you? Ain't there reason enough, Lord knows? 
Ain't you made up your mind to hght out home any- 
how? 

ANDREW 

Yes ; that 's just what she '11 never forgive me for. 
In her heart she '11 never think of me the same. For 
she knows as well as I what pledge I '11 be breaking — 
what sacred pledge. 

JOEL 

What you mean? 

ANDREW 

No matter, no matter : this is gush. 

[He returns to the fire and begins to fumble over the contents 
of his knapsack. Joel zvatches him idly.] 

JOEL 
One of her curls? 

ANDREW 

[Looking at a lock of hair, in the firelight.] 

No ; the baby's, little Andy's. Some day they '11 tell 
him how his father — 

[He winces, and puts the lock away.] 

JOEL 

[Going toward the embankment.] 

Listen ! 

ANDREW 

[Ties up the package, muttering.] 
Son of a traitor ! 



144 



SAM AVERAGE 



JOEL 
[Tiptoeing back.] 
It 's crowed. — That 's her. 

[Leaping to his feet, Andrew stares toward the embankment 
where the flag is dipped; then turns his back to it, clos- 
ing his eyes and gripping his hands. 

After a pause, silently the figure of a Young Woman emerges 
from the dark and stands on the embankment. She is 
bareheaded and ill-clad. 

Joel touches Andrew, who turns and looks toward her. 

Silently, she steals down to him and they embrace.] 

ANDREW 
My Nell ! 

ELLEN 
Nearly a year — 

ANDREW 
Now, at last! 

ELLEN 

Hold me close, Andy. 

ANDREW 
You Ve better? 

ELLEN 

Let 's forget — just for now. 

ANDREW 
Is he grown much? 

ELLEN 

Grown? — You should see him! But so ill: What 
could I do? You see — 

ANDREW 

I know, I know. 



SAM AVERAGE 145 

ELLEN 

The money was all gone. They turned me out at 
the old place, and then — 

ANDREW 
I know, dear. 

ELLEN 

I got sewing, but when the smallpox — 

ANDREW 

I have all your letters, Nell. Come, help me to 
pack. 

ELLEN 

What! You 're really decided— 

JOEL 

[Approaching."] 

Hello, Sis ! 

ELLEN 

[Absently.] 
Ah, Joel: that you? 

[Eagerly, following Andrew to the knapsack.] 
But my dear — 

ANDREW 

Just these few things, and we 're off. 

ELLEN . 

[Agitated.] 

Wait ; wait ! You don't know yet why I've come — 
instead of writing. 



146 SAM AVERAGE 

ANDREW 
I can guess. 

ELLEN 

But you can't: that 's — what 's so hard. I have to 
tell you something, and then — [Slowly.] I must know 
from your own eyes, from yourself, that you wish to 
do this, Andrew : that you think it is right, 

ANDREW 

[Gently.l 

I guessed that. 

ELLEN 

This is what I must tell you. — It 's not just the 
sickness, it 's not only the baby, not the money gone — 
and all that; it 's — it's — 

ANDREW 
{Murmurs.l 
My God ! 

ELLEN 

It 's what all that brings — the helplessness: I Ve 
been insulted. Andy — 

[Her voice breaks.] 

— I want a protector. 

ANDREW 
[Taking her in his arms, where she sobs.} 
There, dear! 



ELLEN 
[With a low moan.] 



You know. 



SAM AVERAGE 147 

ANDREW 

I know. — Come, now: we '11 go. 

ELLEN 

[Her face lighting up.] 

Oh! — and you daref It 's right f 

ANDREW 

[Moving from her, with a hoarse laugh."] 

Dare? Dare I be damned by God and all his 
angels? Ha! — Come, we 're slow. 

JOEL 
Time enough. 

ELLEN 

[Sinking upon Joel's knapsack as a seat, leans her head on 
her hands, and looks strangely at Andrew.] 

I 'd better have written, I 'm afraid. 

ANDREW 

[Controlling his emotion.] 

Now don't take it that way. I Ve considered it all. 

ELLEN 

[With deep quiet.] 

Blasphemously ? 

ANDREW 

Reasonably, my brave wife. When I enlisted, 
I did so in a dream. I dreamed I was called to 
love and serve our country. But that dream is shat- 



148 SAM AVERAGE 

tered. This sordid war, this poHtical murder, has not 
one single principle of humanity to excuse its bloody 
sacrilege. It does n't deserve my loyalty — our loyalty. 

ELLEN 

Are you saying this — for my sake? What of *'God 
and his angels?" 

ANDREW 

[Not looking at her.] 

If we had a just cause — a cause of liberty like that 
in Seventy-six; if to serve one's country meant to 
serve God and His angels — then, yes: a man might 
put away wife and child. He might say: "I will not 
be a husband, a father; I will be a patriot." But now 
— like this — tangled in a web of spiders — caught in a 
grab-net of politicians — and you, you and our baby- 
boy, like this — hell let in on our home — no, Country 
be cursed! 

ELLEN 

[Slowly.] 
So, then, when little Andy grows up — 
ANDREW 
[Groaning.] 
I say that the only thing — 
ELLEN 
T am to tell him — 

ANDREW 
[Defiantly.] 



SAM AVERAGE 



149 



Tell him his father deserted his country, and thank- 
ed God for the chance. 

[Looking about him passionately.] 
Here! 

[He tears a part of the flag from its standard, and reaches 
it toward her.] 

You 're cold; put this round you. 

[As he is putting the strip of colored silk about her shoulders, 
there rises, faint yet close by, a sound of fifes and flutes, 
playing the merry march-strains of "Yankee Doodle." 

At the same time, there enters along the embankment, dimly, 
enveloped in a great cloak, a tall Figure, which pauses 
beside the standard of the torn flag, silhouetted against 
the first pale streaks of the dawn.] 

ELLEN 

[Gazing at Andrew. 

What 's the matter? 

ANDREW 

[Listening.] 

Who are they? Where is it? 

JOEL 

[Starts, alertly.] 

He hears something. 

ANDREW 

Why should they play before daybreak? 

ELLEN 
Andy — 



150 SAM AVERAGE 

JOEL 

[Whispers.] 

Ssh! Look out: we 're spied on. 

[He points to the embankment. Andrew and Ellen draw 
back.] 

THE FIGURE 

[Straightening the flag-standard, and leaning on it.] 

Desartin' ? 

ANDREW 

[Puts Ellen behind him.] 

Who *s there? The watchword! 

THE FIGURE 

God save the smart folks! 

JOEL 

[To Andrew.] 

He 's on to us. Pickle him quiet, or it 's court- 
martial ! 

[Showing a long knife.] 

Shall I give him this? 

ANDREW 

[Taking it from him.] 

No; / will. 

ELLEN 

[Seising his arm.] 
Andrew ! 



SAM AVERAGE 151 

ANDREW 
Let go. 

[The Figure, descending into the entrenchment, approaches 
with face muMed. Joel draws Ellen away. Andrew 
moves toward the Figure slowly. They meet and paused 

You 're a spy! 

[With a quick flash, Andrew raises the knife to strike, hut 
pauses, staring. The Figure, throwing up one arm to 
ward the blow, reveals — through the parted cloak — a 
glint of stars in the firelight.^ 

THE FIGURE 

Steady, boys: I 'm one of ye. The sergeant told 
me to drop round. 

JOEL 
Oh, the sergeant! That 's all right, then. 
ANDREW 
[Dropping the knife.] 

Who are you? 

THE FIGURE 

Who be If My name, ye mean?— My name 's 
Average: Sam Average: Univarsal Sam, some o' my 
prophetic friends calls me. 

ANDREW 

What are you doing here — now? 

r*The head and face of the Figure are partly hidden by a beak- 
shaped cowl. Momentarily, however, when his head is turned toward 
the fire, enough of the face is discernible to reveal his narrow iroii-gray 
beard, shaven upper lip, aquiline nose, and eyes that twinkle in tlie 
dimness.] 



152 SAM AVERAGE 

THE FIGURE 

Oh, tendin* to business. 

JOEL 

Tendin' to other folks' business, eh? 

THE FIGURE 

[With a touch of weariness.] 

Ye-es; reckon that is my business. Some other 
folks is me. 

JOEL 

[Grimacing to Ellen.] 

Cracked ! 

THE FIGURE 

[To Andrew.] 

You 're a mite back'ard in wages, ain't ye? 

ANDREW 

Nine months. What of that? 

THE FIGURE 

That 's what I dropped round for. Seems like when 
a man 's endoored and fit, like you have, for his coun- 
try, and calc'lates he '11 quit, he ought to be takin' a 
little suthin' hom' for Thanksgivin'. So I fetched 
round your pay. 

ANDREW 
My pay ! You ? 

THE FIGURE 
Yes ; I 'm the paymaster. 



SAM AVERAGE 153 

ELLEN 
[Coming forward, eagerly.] 
Andy! The money, is it? 

THE FIGURE 
[Bows with a grave, old-fashioned stateliness.'] 
Your sarvent, Ma'am! 

ANDREW 
[Speaking low,] 
Keep back, Nell. 

[To the Figure.] 
You — you were saying — 

THE FIGURE 

I were about to say how gold bein' scarce down to 
the Treasury, I fetched ye some s'curities instead: 
some national I.O.U's, as ye might say. 

[He takes out an old powder horn, and rattles it quietly.] 

That 's them. 

[Pouring from the horn into his palm some glistening, golden 
grains.] 

Here they be. 

ELLEN 
[Peering, with Joel.] 
Gold, Andy! 

JOEL 
[With a snigger.] 
Gold — nothin'! That 's corn — just Injun corn: ha! 



,154 SAM AVERAGE 

THE FIGURE 

[Bowing gravely.] 

It *s the quality, Ma'am, what counts, as ye might 
say. 

JOEL 

[Behind his hand.] 

His top-loft leaks! 

THE FIGURE 

These here karnels, now, were give' me down Ply- 
mouth way, in Massachusetts, the fust Thanksgivin' 
seems like I can remember. 'T wa'n't long after the 
famine we had thar. Me bein' some hungry, the red- 
folks fetched a hull-lot o' this round, with the 
compliments of their capting — what were his name 
now? — Massasoit. This here 's the last handful on 't 
left. Thought ye might like some, boin' Thanks- 
givin'. 

JOEL 

[In a low voice to Ellen.] 

His screws are droppin' out. Come and pack. We 
've got to mark time and skip. 

THE FIGURE 
[Without looking at Joel.] 

Eight or ten minutes still to spare, boys. The ser- 
geant said — wait till ye hear his jew's-harp playin' of 
that new war tune : The Star Spangled Banner. Then 
ye '11 know the coast 's clear. 



SAM AVERAGE 155 

JOEL 

Gad, that 's right. I remember now. 

[He draws Ellen away to the knapsack, which they begin to 
pack. Andrew has never removed his eyes from the tall 
form in the cloak. 

Now, as the Figure pours back the yellow grains from his 
palm into the powder horn, he speaks, hesitatingly.^ 

ANDREW 

I think — I 'd Hke some. 

THE FIGURE 

Some o' what? 

ANDREW 

Those — my pay. 

THE FIGURE 

[Cheerfully.l 

So; would ye? 

[Handing him the horn.] 

Reckon that 's enough ? 

ANDREW 

[Not taking it.] 

That 's what I want to make sure of — first. 

THE FIGURE 

Oh ! So ye 're hesitatin* ! 

ANDREW 

Yes ; but I want you to help me decide. Pardon me. 



156 



SAM AVERAGE 



Sir ; you 're a stranger ; yet somehow I feel I may ask 
your help. You 've come just in time. 

THE FIGURE 

Queer I should a-dropped round jest now, wa'n't 
it? S'posin' we take a turn. 

[Together they zvalk toward the embankment. 
By the knapsack, Ellen finds the little frame.] 

ELLEN 

[To herself.] 

My picture! 

[She looks toward Andrezv affectionately. 
Joel, lifting the knapsack, beckons to her.] 

JOEL 

There 's more stuff ovci here. 

[He goes off, right; Ellen follows him.] 

ANDREW 

[To the Figure.] 

I should like the judgment of your experience, Sir. 
I can't quite see your face, yet you appear to be one 
who has had a great deal of experience. 

THE FIGURE 

Why, consid'able some. 

ANDREW 

Did you — happen to fight in the late war for inde- 
pendence? 



SAM AVERAGE 1^7 

THE FIGURE 

Happen to? 

[Laughing quietly.] 

N-no, not fight: ye see— I was paymaster. 
ANDREW 
But you went through the war? 
THE FIGURE 
Ye-es, oh yes; I went through it. I took out my 
fust reg'lar papers down to Philadelphie, in '76, seems 
Hke 't was the fourth day o' July. But I was pay- 
master afore that. 

ANDREW 
Tell me: I Ve heard it said there were deserters 
even in those days, even from the roll-call of Wash- 
ington. Is it true? 

THE FIGURE 
True, boy? — Have ye ever watched a prairie fire 
rollin' towards ye, billowin' with flame and smoke, 
and seed all the midget cowerin' prairie-dogs scootin' 
for their holes? Wall, that 's the way I watched 
Howe's army sweepin' crosst the Jarsey marshes, and 
seed the desartin' little patriots, with their chins over 
their shoulders, skedaddlin' home'ards. 
ANDREW 
What— the Americans! 

THE FIGURE 
All but a handful on *em— them as weren't canines, 



158 



SAM AVERAGE 



ye might say, but men. They set a back-fire goln' at 
Valley Forge. Most on 'em burnt their toes and fin- 
gers off, lightin' on 't thar in the white frost, but they 
stuck it through and saved — wall, the prairie-dogs. 

ANDREW 

But they — those others: What reason did they give 
to God and their own souls for deserting? 

THE FIGURE 
To who? 

ANDREW 

To their consciences: What was their reason? It 
must have been a noble one in Seventy-six. Their 
reason then: don't you see, I must have it. I must 
know what reason real heroes gave for their acts. 
You were there. You can tell me. 

THE FIGURE 

Real heroes, eh ? Look around ye, then : To-day *s 
the heroic age, and the true brand o' hero is al'ays in 
the market. Look around ye ! 

ANDREW 

What, here — in this war of jobsters, this petty cam- 
paign of monstrous boodle? 

THE FIGURE 
Thar we be! 

ANDREW 

Why, here are only a lot of cowardly half-men, like 
me — lovers of their own folks — their wives and babies 
at home. They '11 make sacrifices for them. But real 



SAM AVERAGE 1 59 

men like our fathers in Seventy-six: they looked in 
the beautiful face of Liberty, and sacrificed to her! 

THE FIGURE 

Our fathers, my boy, was jest as fond o' poetry as 
you be. They talked about the beautiful face o' Lib- 
erty same 's you; but when the hom'-made eyes and 
cheeks of their sweethearts and young uns took to 
cryin', they desarted their beautiful goddess and skun 
out horn'. 

ANDREW 

But there were some — 

THE FIGURE 

Thar was some as didn't — yes; and thar 's some as 
don't to-day. Those be the folks on my pay-roll. 
Why, look a-here : I calc'late I wouldn't fetch much on 
the beauty counter. My talk ain't rhyme stuff, nor the 
Muse o' Grammar wa'n't my schoolma'am. Th' ain't 
painter nor clay-sculptor would pictur' me jest like I 
stand. For the axe has hewed me, and the plough has 
furrered; and the arnin' of gold by my own elbow- 
grease has give' me the shrewd eye at a bargain. I 
manure my crops this side o' Jordan, and as for 
t'other shore, I 'd ruther swap jokes with the Lord 
than listen to his sarmons. And yet for the likes o' 
me, jest for to arn my wages — ha, the many, many 
boys and gals that 's gone to their grave-beds, and 
when I a-closed their eyes, the love-light was shinin' 
thar. 



l6o SAM AVERAGE 

ANDREW 

[Who has listened, with awe.] 

What are you ? What are you ? 

THE FIGURE 

Me? I 'm the pay-master. 

ANDREW 

I want to serve you — Hke those others. 

THE FIGURE 

Slow, slow, boy! Nobody sarves me. 

ANDREW 

But they died for you — the others. 

THE FIGURE 

No, 't wasn't for me: 't was for him as pays the 
wages: the one as works through me — the one higher 
up. I 'm only the pay-master: kind of a needful 
makeshift — his obedient sarvent. 

ANDREW 
[ With increasing curiosity, seeks to peer in the Figure's face.] 
But the one up higher — who is he? 

THE FIGURE 

[Turning his head away.] 

Would ye sarve him, think, if ye heerd his voice? 

ANDREW 
[Ardently, drawing closer.] 
And saw his face! 



SAM AVERAGE l6i 

[Drawing his cozvl lower and taking Andrew's arm, the Fig- 
ure leads him up on the embankment, where they stand 
together.] 

THE FIGURE 



Hark a-yonder ! 

Is it thunder? 
Have ye forgot? 



ANDREW 
[LisfeningJ] 

THE FIGURE 



ANDREW 

The voice! I remember now: — Niagara! 

[With azve, Andrew looks tozvard the Figure, who stands 
shrouded and still, facing the dawn. From far off comes 
a sound as of falling waters, and with that — a deep, mur- 
murous voice, which seems to issue from the Figure's 
cowl.] 

THE VOICE 

I am the Voice that was heard of your fathers, and 
your fathers' fathers. Mightier — mightier, I shall be 
heard of your sons. I am the IMillion in whom the 
one is lost, and I am the One in whom the millions are 
saved. Their ears shall be shut to my thunders, their 
eyes to my blinding stars. In shallow streams they 
shall tap my life-blood for gold. With dregs of coal 
and of copper they shall pollute me. In the mystery 
of my mountains they shall assail me; in the majesty 
of my forests, strike me down ; with engine and der- 
rick and mill-stone, bind me their slave. Some for a 



l62 SAM AVERAGE 

lust, some for a love, shall desert me. One and one, 
for his own, shall fall away. Yet one and one and one 
shall return to me for life; the deserter and the de- 
stroyer shall re-create me. Primeval, their life-blood 
is mine. My pouring waters are passion, my light- 
nings are laughter of man. I am the One in whom the 
millions are saved, and I am the Million in whom the 
one is lost. 

ANDREW 

[Yearningly, to the Figure.] 

Your face! 

[The Figure turns majestically away. Andrew clings to him.] 

Your face! 

[In the shadow of the flag, the Figure unmuMes for an instant. 

Peering, dazzled, Andrew staggers back, with a low cry, and, 
covering his eyes, falls upon the embankment. 

From azvay, left, the thrumming of a Jew's-harp is heard, play- 
ing "The Star Spangled Banner." 

From the right, enter Joel and Ellen. 

Descending from the embankment, the Figure stands apart. \ 

JOEL 
Well, Colonel Average, time 's up. 
ELLEN 
[Seeing Andrew's prostrate form, hastens to him.] 
Andy! What 's happened? 
ANDREW 
[Rising slowly.] 
Come here. I '11 whisper it. 



SAM AVERAGE 163 

[He leads her beside the embankment, beyond which the 
dawn is beginning to redden.] 

JOEL 

Yonder 's the sergeant's Jew's harp. That 's our 
signal, Nell. So long, Colonel. 

THE FIGURE 
[Nodding.] 
So long, sonny. 

ANDREW 

[Holding Ellen's hands, passionately.] 

You understand? You dof ' 

ELLEN 

[Looking in his eyes.] 

I understand, dear. 

[They kiss each other.] 

JOEL 

[Calls low.] 

Come, you married turtles. The road 's clear. Fol- 
low me now. Sneak. 

[Carrying his knapsack, Joel climbs over the embankment, 

and disappears. 
The thrumming of the jew's-harp continues. 
Ellen, taking the strip of silk flag from her shoulders, ties it 

to the standard.] 

ANDREW 
[Faintly.] 
God bless you! 



l64 ^AM AVERAGE 

ELLEN 

[As they part hands.] 

Good-bye ! 

[The Figure has remounted the embankment, where — in the 
distincter glow of the red dazvn — the grey folds of his 
cloak, hanging from his shoulders, resemble the half- 
closed zvings of an eagle, the beaked cowl falling, as a 
kind of visor, before his face, concealing it.] 

THE FIGURE 
Come, little gal. 

[Ellen goes to him, and hides her face in the great cloak. 
As she does so, he draws from it a paper, writes on it, and 
hands it to Andrew, ivith the pozvder horn.] 

By the bye, Andy, here 's that s'curity. Them here 
's my initials: they 're all what 's needful. Jest file 
this in the right pigeonhole, and you '11 draw your 
pay. — Keep your upper lip, boy. I'll meet ye later, 
mebbe, at Lundy's Lane. 

ANDREW 
[Wistfully.] 
You '11 take her home? 

THE FIGURE 

Yes: reckon she '11 housekeep for your uncle, till 
you get back; won't ye, Nellie? Come, don't cry, 
little gal. We '11 soon git 'quainted. 'T ain't the fust 
time sweethearts has called me Uncle. 

[Flinging back his great cloak, he throws one wing of it, with 
his arm, about her shoulders, thus with half its reverse 



SAM AVERAGE 



165 



side draping her with shining stripes and stars. By the 
same action, his own figure is made partly visible — the 
legs clad in the tight, instep-strapped trousers [blue and 
white] of the Napoleonic era. Holding the girl gently to 
him — while her face turns back toward Andrew — he leads 
her, silhouetted against the sunrise, along the embank- 
ment, and disappears. 

Meantime the thrumming twang of the jew's-harp grows 
sweeter, mellower, modulated with harmonies that, filling 
now the air with elusive strains of the American war- 
hymn, mingle with the faint dawn-twitterings of birds. 

Andrew stares silently after the departed forms; then, slowly 
coming down into the entrenchment, lifts from the ground 
his gun and ramrod, leans on the gun, and — reading the 
paper in his hand by the growing light — mutters it aloud: 

U. S. A. 

Smiling sternly, he crumples the paper in his fist, makes a wad 
of it, and rams it into his gun^harrel 



FINIS. 



NOTE 



NOTE FOR "THE ANTICK." 

In her scene with John, JuHe Bonheur sings snatches 
of the following two songs, popular among the Cana- 
dian French for generations, and still sung by them. 
The music to both may be found in Ernest Gagnon's 
''Chansons Populaires du Canada," pages 124 and 151. 



TENAOUICHE TENAGA, OUICH'KA! 

Cetait un vieux sauvage 
Tout noir, tout barbouilla, 

Quich'ka ! 
Avec sa vieill' couverte 
Et son sac a tabac. 

Ouich'ka! 
Ah! ah! tenaouich' tenaga, 
Tenaouich' tenaga, ouich'ka! 



Avec sa vieill' couverte 
Et son sac a tabac. 

Ouich'ka ! 
— Ton camarade est more, 
Est mort et enterra. 

Ouich'ka ! 
Ah! ah! tenaouich' tenaga, 
Tenaouich' tenaga, ouich'ka! 

Ton camarade est more. 
Est mort et enterra. 

Ouich'ka ! 
C'est quatre vieux sauvages 
Qui port'nt les coins du drap. 

Ouich'ka ! 
Ah! ah! tenaouich' tenaga, 
Tenaouich' tenaga, ouich'ka! 

C'est quatre vieux sauvages 
Qui port'nt les coins du drap. 
Ouich'ka 1 

168 



Et deux vieill's sauvagesses 
Qui chant'nt le libera. 
Ouich'ka ! 
Ah! ah! tenaouich' tenaga, 
Tenaouich' tenaga, ouich'ka! 

AH! QUI MARIERONS-NOUS? 

Ah! qui mari'rons-nous? [bis] 

Mademoiseir, ce sera vous, 

Par I'assemble' d'amour. 

Oui j'aimerai qui m'aim . qui m'aime « 

Oui j'aimerai qui m'aimera. 

'Lui donn'rons pour epoux? [bis] 
Mon doux Monsieur, ce sera vous, 
Par I'assemble' d'amour. 
Oui j'aimerai, etc. 

Amours, sakiez vous!^ [bis] 
Sakiez vous cinq ou six coups, 
Par I'assemble' d'amour. 
Oui j'aimerai, etc. 

Amours, retirez vous! [bis] 

Retirez vous chacun chez vous, 

Par I'assemble' d'amour. 

Oui j'aimerai qui m'aim . qui m'aime . 

Oui j'aimerai qui m'aimera. 

The refrain 

Qui j'aimerai qui m'aim .. qui m'aime . 

Oui j'aimerai qui m'aimera 
is lilted by Julie, as she dances on the grass by the 
wayside. 



169 



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